


What Remains

by flollius



Series: Tracing Lines [3]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Baby Fíli and Kíli, Backstory, Durin Family Feels, F/M, Family Politics, Post-Trauma Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-20
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2017-12-24 04:09:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 58,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/935136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flollius/pseuds/flollius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After fifty years, Dís returns to her people with two fatherless children, her secrets locked behind her lips. Thorin attempts to establish a new line of Durin and hold on to his fading crown, attacked on all sides as both Longbeards and Ironfists try to tear away his right to rule. And in the middle of everything, Fíli tries to let go of the past and be the prince that will save Durin's Folk from ruin. But memories of darkness are not so easily stamped out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Made of Stone

**Author's Note:**

> YAY ANOTHER PRE-FIC
> 
> This one is going to clear a LOT more stuff up too - I hope. The first part is very character-driven, mainly because I wanted to sort of establish everything a little bit first, sort of get a feel for everyone before we plunge into the action 
> 
> Also, babies. I couldn't help it - Baby Fíli and Kíli are just too cute - how can you not write thousands of words about how adorable they are, really. 
> 
> (Also special thanks to Tawabids for reading this over and making sure it wasn't completely crap and telling me it's okay to be indulgent and flesh it out a bit more. All the mistakes are entirely my own slack editing though)

It feels like some sort of dream to her.

She sits astride a mule, as she did years, decades, lifetimes before, dutifully led by her brother along the mountain passes. But she is older, older than she ever imagined. Fíli winds his arms around her thick waist, hands not meeting, cheek pressing against her back. The infant sleeps on her breast, bound in a sling.

Thorin pauses to look back at her, locked in the bottom of a steep valley. The sky above them is blue and grey and purple, like a bruise. The sun is a dying ember in the west. Tears are in his eyes, and he gives a wavering smile.

“We’re almost home.”

-

Thorin wants a welcoming ceremony, but Dís is content to slip quietly into place. She would rather drift in like a ghost, slowly taking shape as eyes slowly open around her. She does not want another feast in her honour, ever. She does not want nannies and nursemaids and strings of rooms crammed with polished furniture. She wants to be left alone with her children, her lion-cub and her changeling.

Thorin’s home is small and humble. A single room, carved from the rock. A fire, a table, a sideboard, a bed in the corner. She stands on the threshold, feeling her heart throb, deep in her chest. Fíli clings to her skirt, looking into the cold, dim room.

Thorin apologetic, he crouches before heart with tinder and flint. It’s not much, but he’s never needed much. He was only ever alone. He never needed more than this.

It is a penance. Dís stands in the small hovel, shaking her head. He has assumed a life of poverty and discomfort, to alleviate the burning guilt of his deepest sins. He didn’t keep a single piece of the gold he traded for her. This room is bare and empty and cold.

Fíli refuses to let go, even as she sits on the edge of the bed and feeds the baby. He leans against her arm until it feels numb, watching the thin pale face crease in a soft whimper. Thorin crouches awkwardly before the weak fire, leaving his sister to her children.

-

It’s a dream and a nightmare for Thorin, bound together in thick knots, tangled in his head and he cannot pick them out.

To wake in the morning and hear Dís breathing beside him is the sweetest joy he can ever remember. He lies on the mattress, simply watching her chest rise and fall in slow, heavy breaths. There are two children, two wonderful dwarrows that he loves unreservedly. Fíli is quiet, painfully shy and afraid to talk. Kíli is still, too still, and Thorin doesn’t like the bones under his skin.

Dís is withdrawn and pale. He can see she is hurting, she bleeds from a wound in her heart and he cannot do a thing to stop it. He can hold her and whisper soft words of comfort all he likes, but they mean nothing to her. She turns away from him, lies on her side, staring at the wall.

He tells her one morning, when Fíli is still asleep. He whispers that her prince is gone, Thorin has shorn and marked him and he is destined to wander the earth alone. He will never hurt her again. Dís stares up at the ceiling, her face still and white as a painted doll, and Thorin isn’t sure that she has even heard him, until she reaches out and squeezes her hand.

“Let’s never speak of it again.” She breathes into the muffled, earthy air.

-

Of course Dwalin comes to see them again. He cooks up some stupid excuse about needing Thorin to see something, but when he looks in her eyes they both know it her he came to see.

“He’s out.” But Dwalin knew that already, she’s sure. “Do you want me to pass something on to him.”

“Nay, no need.” He stomps inside their house all the same, casting gaze over the bundle of blankets inside the wicker basket, the golden-haired child grasping his toys on the rug. “Dís –” He turns, very suddenly, and she finds herself looking up at him, their chests a foot apart. “How are things?”

“I’ve been here two days, Dwalin.” Her voice is on the edge of a whisper. “I don’t know yet.” He squeezes her arm in a clumsy gesture of comfort, and she can’t look into his eyes without fear of crying.

-

Thorin and Dís move into an uneasy companionship. It’s tentative at first, they forgot how to coexist. After forty years apart, it is jarring to have him return to her side, stubborn and obstinate and overbearing. He forgets himself, criticises her, complains and sometimes snaps.

She’s just as terrible. Her retorts are biting and sharp. She is strong-willed and sure. She will not, not _ever_ let another dwarf hold such overpowering dominance over her. Even her brother. Their arguments always dissolve though, when either one of them looks to the side and sees Fíli staring up at the pair with tears in his dark blue eyes.

-

“What about Thráin?” Thorin looks at the bundle of cloth in a borrowed wicker basket. Blankets spill out, the infant whimpering quietly. “That could be nice. Something that ties him to us.”

“You said yourself.” Dís eats slowly, eyes on her food. Fíli sits in her lap, squeezing handfuls of coarse mashed potatoes through sticky fingers.  “Brothers are named together.” She looks tired. “Give me a few more days.”

“Take your time.” He reaches across the table, callused fingers brushing the back of her palm. “The name-ceremony won’t be for months.” She nods silently.  “They’ll need devices. I’ll sort it all out tomorrow. Fíli needs something around his neck.”

“All right.” Her pale whisper falls to the floor, hands cold on the child’s shoulder.

-

Fíli is quiet. He clings to his mother, refusing to let her out of his sight for even a moment. She has to carry him on her hip when his legs grow tired, the baby wrapped in his sling. She feels bowed down with the weight.

Durin’s Folk stare at her, her two sons. Dís cannot walk anywhere without their bending and whispering, their darting eyes. It is not malicious. She knows they are merely curious. She reunites with handfuls of old acquaintances. Balin hugs her tightly and whispers that it’s good to see her again. He ruffles Fíli’s hair, the blonde drawing back.

Three days after their arrival, Thorin ties a fragment of mithril around Fíli’s neck. Durin’s device is stamped upon it, and there’s a glimmering sadness in his eyes, as he crouches before his nephew. Dís knows he must have sacrificed an ancient family treasure, to make it.

-

“I think I have a name.”

They are sitting before the fire, legs stretched out on the deerskin rug. Thorin is whittling, Dís darns a sock. They are almost like children, playing with clumsy little toys. Thorin lowers the half-shaped block of wood, the firelight reflecting his blue eyes.

“Kíli.” She feels the heat of the fire on her limbs, her cheeks grow red. “None of their ancestors are named Kíli. There’s a Víli and a Gíli and a Nyíli,” Their eyes meet. “But no Kíli. It’s new. Different.”

“Kíli.” Thorin smiles. “It sounds beautiful.”

-

She has a nightmare. She dreams she is in her bed, this bed, she opens her eyes and that blonde monster is standing over her, snarling like a beast, grabbing her shoulders and screaming screaming screaming in her face. _I’m going to kill you. I’m going to murder you. You stupid bitch. You will pay for what you have done._

She jerks awake. There are tears on her face and she can’t slow the beating of her heart. She feels wet, as though she has been held underwater, thrusting and screaming and sobbing. Perhaps that’s why she can’t breathe.

Fíli’s hair gleams in the sunken red light of the embers. She stretches out, strokes the soft spun gold with a finger. Idly, she wonders if there’s some sort of plant or flower they could use, to darken it.

-

Dwalin takes to seeing her, once or twice a week, when he knows Thorin is out. He brings something; a toy for Fili, a spare hammer he borrowed from Thorin, a paper Balin needs him to sign. He hangs in the doorway awkwardly until Dís lets him in, walking carefully on the stone ground, as though it would crack under his weight.

He never stays long. He stares down at his hands, asking cautious questions about vague, unimportant matters. It bores the both of them. He doesn’t sit until Dís offers him a stool, he doesn’t smoke his pipe in her house, and he always leaves his boots at the door. He’s still and polite, the _fussiest_ of her few houseguests. She sits across from him, answering his drab questions with as much detail as she can muster, one of the children in her arms. He tries to act as though he’s not looking at her, but she sees the glances out of the corner of his eye.

“You don’t have to make up an excuse every time you want to see me.” After a few months, she’s had enough of this stiff politeness, the long minutes of silence. It’s not how she wants to be with him. Dwalin’s hand grips the doorframe as she speaks; he’s turned to go, but her soft little words have cracked him. “Just come and say hello, from time to time.” He glances back for a moment, seeing her nervous little smile. He looks as though he can’t breathe.

“A-Aye.” He finally chokes the word out, eyes darting across the ragged little cluster of wooden facades and holes in the stone. “I’ll be seeing you, Dís.”

And it’s wonder that he didn’t fall at her feet then.

-

The dream solidifies. There are two small children to look after, two lives that came from her, two mouths to feed and bodies to clean. Kíli is so very tiny and thin, and Fíli clings to her and refuses to be left alone.

She lives for them.

Her changeling grows. His eyes are wide and dark, and when he looks up at her, Dís has an image of Frerin. It’s not painful to her – it’s almost comforting, to have that soft brown gaze fixed on her. It feels as though part of him is still here. It is a cord between Dís and Kíli. He doesn’t look like a child of Durin, with his little nose and his thin jaw. But he has Frerin’s big brown eyes somehow and she cradles the infant close to her chest, finally starting to believe that everything will be all right.

-

Fíli is a gift for Thorin. He is sturdy, red-cheeked, and stubborn. His nose is sharp, angled. His jaw is strong. His hair is blonde but everything else is drawn in Durin’s image; a perfect tracing of those ancient lines carved in the stone. Thorin dotes on his nephew, carving toys and figurines beside the fire.

The relationship builds slowly, over months. Dís does not speak a word of it, but Thorin sees Fíli hiding behind her and he knows that something terrible has happened to his nephew. Anger swells inside of him, making his hands shake and heart push hot blood along his veins.

The first time he tries to touch Fíli, the dwarrow jerks away, whimpering. Thorin is too fast, too eager, and it takes some days for Fíli to crawl across the old deerskin rug towards him. Thorin takes the figures he’s carved, the toys that have been gifted to Fíli, telling stories with his hands. Long evenings pass, Thorin recounting every bit of myth and history he knows.

And two months after Thorin first sparked life into the fire, Fíli leans against his side, sucking on his thumb, grabbing a handful of Thorin’s tunic. His tears are silent, but Dís can see them, shining in the firelight.

-

When Dís first meets Glori, it is by accident. She is reaching for a potato at a market stall, the scar shining white on her wrist. She does not hide it – she is _not_ ashamed. But nobody has uttered a word. She whispered to Thorin that it was an accident; he pulled his lips tight and said no more and that was that.

But Glori double-takes when she sees it. She hides her shock and feigns propriety, offering her hand to Dís and introducing herself demurely. Dís is stiff and cold at first, taking the dam for another nosey busybody getting in her business. But when Glori introduces her son Nori and claps him on the shoulder, her sleeves rolled up to the elbow, her knotted wrists smooth and unmarked, the weary propriety dissolves.

Within a week, the two of them are the best of friends and Dís cannot imagine life without her.

-

“Nay Dís, I don’t think-”

“Oh, hush and sit _down.”_ She pushes on his shoulders, laughing as Dwalin sinks into the low stool. “And _don’t_ move.” Dís reaches inside the basket, holding the babe close. “He’s a peaceful baby. He won’t squirm or cry.” Dwalin’s hands are tight, clenched in his lap. “Here.” She holds Kíli out to him.

“Dís.” Dwalin’s voice is almost a whisper. “I don’t know how...”

“It’s just a baby.” She crooks his left arm, gently laying Kíli along the limb, his dark head pillowed on his monstrous palm. “Keep holding his head up.” Dwalin stares down at the infant in his arms, not breathing. “See?” She stands behind him, her hands on his shoulders.

“H-He’s so _small.”_ Dwalin’s voice is thick. His heart throbs at the baby, the hands on his shoulders. Dís laughs in his ear, tightening her grip.

“He is, isn’t he?” She sounds almost relieved, to hear it from him. “He’s very small.” Kíli opens his eyes, his big brown eyes that make Dís ache, staring up at Dwalin in judgeless silence.

-

They move into a bigger house.

Thorin is reluctant – he accepts reality with heavy, downcast eyes, and Dís realises his self-styled punishment of poverty is the only thing that keeps the guilt from consuming him. She holds him tight, whispers that it’s all right, they are together and safe and _nothing_ else matters, but he is distant. He doesn’t believe her.

Thorin enlists the help of Dwalin and Gloin, to help him build. They hollow out a small disused cave in the good stone and build a facade of wood, big enough for the four of them to live in comfort. Thorin still takes the smallest room, sleeping on a narrow, hard bed and Dís cannot sway him.

She watches the three of them work, stripped to the waist. Dwalin’s back gleams with old scars, with sweat and tattoos along his spine. She curls her hands into fists and bites her lip, trying to keep the bad thoughts out.

-

 _You’re sick._ Hatred rises inside of her.

She can’t stop thinking about him, lying in her cold, empty bed, looking up at the stone. She still sees him, half-naked and gleaming, grinning as the sweat pours down his face, pausing to lean on his pick, the muscles on his back heaving as he took in deep breaths of air.

She squeezes her eyes shut, nails digging into her palms. She tries to force it out of her head. She tries to think of something else. That part of her life is closed to her now – she promised, she _promised_ , that no one else would ever touch her again. Disgust gnaws at her, leaving her bleeding. She was weak. It’s debased her, that hot sickness in her stomach.

How could she ever think of anyone else, after what had happened?

-

She wonders if what she’s doing is wrong, sometimes.

It’s no secret that Dwalin is still in love with her. He never married, never courted, never even laid eyes on another dam. It had only ever been Dís in his mind, ever since she was twenty years old, a blue-wrapped nightingale singing in the feast-hall of Erebor.

They reminisce in the front room of her new home, sitting around that same wooden table. Erebror, the road, Dunland. They share a lot of the same memories. He tells what stories he can, of the fifty years they spent apart, but they’re dull, about mines and smiths and stone, and he can tell she doesn’t really want to hear them.

She doesn’t give anything away, not deliberately. But Dwalin is quick. He notices her abrupt shifts in conversation, her downcast eyes as conversation darkens. And half-sentences do slip out. She lets fragments of her memories fall, and he scrabbles to pick them up, holding them close and trying to put them together.

Dwalin’s getting better with the children. Fíli’s trust is hard to win over, especially among dwarves. Dís whispers that he never has a problem with dams and dwarrows, it’s only the husbands and fathers that make him draw back, shrinking away to seek comfort in his mother’s skirts. It’s another piece of information he files away.

Kíli on the other hand, loves everybody. He doesn’t care who holds him in their arms – he pulls at beards and braids indiscriminately, laughing, gabbling in his baby talk. Dís leans her elbows on the table and she can see that Dwalin is absolutely smitten with her youngest son. Everybody else seems to prefer Fíli, sturdy and handsome, to his thin, pale little brother. But Dwalin spends most of his visits with Kíli in his arms, his downcast smiles obvious.

And he never raises his voice to her. Not once. She never sees anything more than a shadow of a frown cross her face. He makes her smile. His reverence is alien to her. She is used to her husband’s violent passion, Thorin’s gloomy misery. Dwalin is a bright spot in her life, and she finds herself drawn to him.

And both of them dare to wonder what could have been.

-

Glori encourages her to take up tobacco, for her nerves. She can see the princess is anxious and on edge. Dís opens up to her, a flower in the sunshine. She nervously recounts the Orocani Mountains, her husband, her father-in-law, the people she was forced to live amongst. She recalls the grey-blue eyes, staring helplessly up at the stone ceiling, just waiting for it all to end.

Glori has her own stories. She tells Dís of how she fell in love, far, far too young, with a dwarf above her rank and station. She should have realised it was odd, in hindsight. Someone smarter would have seen what was going to happen. He left of course, the moment she found out she was pregnant, without a farthing to give to her. Her mother threw her out, and there wasn’t much else she could do, to keep a roof over her head, to keep food in Dori’s belly. She never had the patience for demure spinning or weaving or sewing.

And besides, she earned more in one night on her back than she would bent over a loom for a week.

“If you could go back, would you change things?” Dís stares at her, coarse and crude, broad as a mountain and unmoving. “Would you change it for a normal life, a husband, dwarrows that bore his name?”

“Cooking meals and scrubbing floors, holding my tongue and keeping my eyes lowered?” She rolls her eyes. Threads of silver glint in her hair, her eyes and cheeks marked with lines. She’s older than Dís first thought. She learns later that Glori paints her face before going out, touching up her grey hair with black ink in an effort to look younger. “I’d rather jump down a mine shaft.” She leans forward, dropping ash over the floor. “We’re _lucky,_ you and me Dís.” There’s a gleam in her hazel eyes. Dís remembers that she was very beautiful, a long time ago.

“The other dams, they have husbands and fathers to answer to. Who do we have?” She waves her hands in the empty air. “No one has the right to tell you what to do. _No one._ ” She thumps her fist on the lopsided table, eyes darkening. She looks like a witch, with her downturned lips, the shadows filling up the lines in her face and spilling over, the silver in her hair glistening in the firelight. “No one can tell you how to raise those boys, Dís. They are yours and yours alone.”

“Thorin –”

“Thorin has no claim to them. Did _he_ birth them?” She leans back. “Don’t let him beat you, Dís. He’ll try to turn Fíli into the rest of them. Gold-mad and arrogant.” She spits in the memory of Durin’s curse. “He _sold_ you, like as though you were a beast in his possession. Don’t forget that.”

“No.” She feels oddly light-headed, staring down at her knees. It’s as though someone is screaming in her ear, her head is pounding and the ringing sound won’t go away. “No – I won’t.”

-

It takes a long time, but eventually Fíli allows Dwalin to pick him up and sit him on his knee. He traces his fingers over the tattoos on Dwalin’s hands, interrupting the adults and asking what some of them mean. Not all of them are linked to happy memories, and it pains Dwalin to bring them up. Eventually, Dís has to send him away, just to get a moment’s peace. She brings her stool closer, leaning in to whisper at him.

“He’s just curious – I’m sorry.” She looks down at her own hands. “You probably don’t want to remember them.”

“Whether I want to remember them or not, they’re there.” He’s looking at her hands too. Her scar. She turns her hand inward, pressing her wrist against the table. “But you...  he’s dead to you, isn’t he?”

“I wish he was.” Her voice is a low, trembling whisper. “But he’s not. He’s not ever going to go away Dwalin.” He reaches out, taking her hand. It’s so slim, so little and white and delicate in his. He feels rough, his hands too coarse and crude for the gentleness that she needs.

“You can tell me anything.” He leans in, their heads bent close. “Anything Dís. Whatever you ask of me – I’ll do it. I’ll do anything.”

“Oh–”She looks up at him, his face so close to hers now. They stared, locked in silence, his hand wrapped around hers. Her mouth has gone dry and she can’t form the words to speak. They’re thick, awkward in her mind. She knows what it is he wants.

She pulls away, sliding her hand free and folding it in her lap. Both of them sit wordlessly, struggling to think of things they can say for several minutes. Dwalin eventually staggers into conversation about some new seam of coal, and Dís nods, pretending to be interested in what he has to say.

“You don’t have to do anything.” She whispers at him, when he makes to leave. “Just be here. Just drink my ale and tell the boys stories and give me something to laugh about.” It’s enough to drive those memories out of her head.

-

 “He’s a little dear.” Glori bounces the child on her knee, Kíli cackling with glee. He’s a year old and teething. “Know which one he looks like yet?”

“If he’s pure dwarf it can only be _him._ ” Dís is grateful that Nori has taken Fíli away and left the two alone. “The Men – they had red hair and light eyes. Kíli’s too dark.” They both look at him, critically examining his thin arms, his small nose. “I don’t know what would be worse.”

“Could be better, if he’s half.” Glori puffs on a huge black pipe, stretching her legs out as she leans back. “Better to be a Man than an Ironfist, in my opinion.” Dís doesn’t disagree with her. “Is it getting easier?”

“Slowly.” She rests her elbow on the table, leaning on a flattened palm. “It’s hard – remembering – wondering, all the time, who he’s going to wind up looking like.” Dís’ eyes lower to the ground. “I know it’s not his fault.”

“Nori’s the same.” Dís jerks up. “I wasn’t working the night I met his father – I just popped in for ale before bed but this _damn_ nasty bugger kept his eye on me. Blind drunk. Didn’t know him, but he knew who _I_ was. I told him I wasn’t working, to come find me tomorrow and not flash his coin about. Should’o realised what was going to happen. He waited for me to leave and knocked me down in the shadows where nobody could see us. And you know,” Her lip curls, “he didn’t even have the decency to pay after.” Glori gives a small, helpless shrug. “It was hard. It was hard to look at Nori without everything rushing back. But I did, in the end. You learn to cut the memories away.”

“I didn’t realise...”

“Nobody does.” Glori blows a plume of blue smoke into the air, drifting lazily above them both. “Dori just thinks I couldn’t keep my legs closed.” But she doesn’t sound sad, as she speaks. She does not delve into self-pity, reaching for sympathy. Her tone is frank, and matter-of-fact. It was what it was and nothing could ever change it now. “It doesn’t matter. He’s here, he’s living and we have to make the best.” She runs her fingers over his ribs, tickling him. “He’s gorgeous, Dís. He’ll be fighting the dams off in sixty years.” Glori winks at her, grinning with her teeth all stained, blackened from tobacco and gum-rot.

-

Dís undresses the baby on the bed, running her fingers over his skin. His limbs are thin and wiry, the bones of his ribs are showing and it is nobody’s fault. She tries to remember how big Fíli was at this age, tries to figure out if his torso really is too long, if his hands are too bony and his nose too small.

He is Kíli. She closes her eyes, takes in a deep breath. It doesn’t matter, in the end. There was no father, there never was a father. There’s no difference between that dreadlocked bastard and the string of Easterlings he dragged in behind him. Dís hears Kíli whimper, small and restless.

At least he’s not a crier, she tells herself. There is some mercy, in that.

-

She sees it now as Glori sees it. A curse. A black spot, a foul creature that has worked its way beneath the skin, entwining around a heart, squeezing and pulsating, constricting until it will not beat.

She stares into the fire, soft gold streaming through her fingers. Fíli is sill and quiet, kneeling obediently on the floor as he turns the key in his fingers. A disease, passed from father to son, down the line with that hard nose and those crystal blue eyes. The Ironfists lust for flesh, for blood, for the sound of cracking bones beneath their hands and screams of pain. Durin's folk lust for gold. That is what destroyed them. They overstepped, in their blind hubris and greed. They _deserved_ Smaug.

Dís feels cold, wrapped in linen with a blanket draped around her. Her heart sinks; ice throbs in her veins, pushing down her limbs and into her fingertips. Too much, it was too much and they will never get it back. That fleeting glimpse of extravagance will shine as the last moment of greatness, in a line fading to grey. They will never have that wealth again.

She looks up, at the figure of her brother. He is an outline, bent in his chair with a knife in his hands. He sharpens it, iron on stone, the scraping sound rising against the crackling of the flames. He hasn't forgotten. He will _never_ forget. Dragons are summoned. They _come_ , when the stench of gold rises on the wind and crosses the empty desert. Dís stares, watching his thick fingers stroke the edge of the knife. But he knows. He feels it too; he feels that black thing crawling inside of him, writhing towards his heart. He cuts himself off from wealth completely, shirking his mail and furs when they are alone, wearing thin, coarse rags of sackcloth. He removes temptation, as though the hunger and cold will shield him from that beast.

Erebor will kill him, in the end. She knows it. She feels her fingers clench, stiff and cold around Fili's golden hair.

-

It is a very cold night. Fíli and Kíli sleep before the fire, their bedclothes moved into the front room where they will be warm. But there is not enough room for three, and after getting up in the night to feed her youngest, Dís pads softly back towards her room. She stops, listening in as she passes Thorin’s room and pulling back the curtain.

He is sitting up in bed, wrapped in the only blanket he can bear to have, his head against his knees, breathing in harsh, ragged gasps. His hair drapes over his trembling shoulders like a loose shawl. Dís stands in the doorway, looking through the dark with a candle in her hand. He looks up at the light, face pinched and pale and drawn.

“You idiot.” She breathes softly, walking across the room, holding her hand out. “Come with me.”

His skin is like ice against hers. He is reluctant, but Dís knows more than him about keeping warm in the coldest of nights. He lies, stiff and uncomfortable as a board in her soft bed. She has to kick at his knees, rolling him over onto his side and pushing herself in behind him.

“You don’t have to freeze to make a point.” Her voice is soft in his ear. He stares at the candle, feeling his eyes burn. “It’s all right, Thorin.”

“Is it?” He is still shaking. She rubs her hand along his arm, trying to bring life into the frozen flesh. “I can’t ever – there’s no words – I just – _I’m so sorry_.” He presses his face into the pillow, trying to muffle his tears. “I _destroyed_ you – I destroyed everything – for gold.” He grits his teeth, bitter and cold. “I will _never_ forgive myself Dís. Never.”

“You were being my King.” She buries her nose in his hair, breathing slowly, in and out. It feels strange, so very strange, to lie with this sturdy, thick body in her arms. It is an ancient memory to her, one not entirely unhappy and it makes her almost ashamed to admit that.

“But I’m your _brother.”_ He sounds agonised. The wound never healed, not for him. He will _always_ regret this, until his dying breath.

“You couldn’t be both.” She tries to fight the quaver in her voice. “Not then.” She presses her lips against the back of his head, for a brief moment. “You did right by our people. But now it’s time to be my brother.” Her arms tighten around him. “And the boys – be Uncle Thorin. Not their King. Promise me that.” She has him, she hopes against all hope that she has him, here in her bed, with his warming body pressed so closely to her. He cannot deny her this. “We can make this right.” She breathes, trying to worm into his heart. She knows it still beats, beneath the thick armour, the pride, the stubborn arrogance. She stretches out, clawing at it, longing to hold it in her hand. “Fíli can change things. He can break our curse.”

“The Ironfist in him will not let us.” Thorin’s voice is low and dull, and she is swamped with the urge to hit him. “He is _worse_ , worse than one pure of Durin’s line, don’t you see?”

“No, _you_ don’t see.” Her words are sharp and cutting, they dig into him like a knife. “Ironfists don’t care for gold, Thorin.” She clings to him. “He can save us.”

Thorin stares at the solitary candleflame, filled with memories of fire, of smoke and ash, blackening the sky, of screaming and running feet and howls of agony. He does not answer her.

-

When Fíli is six, Dís judges him old enough to help with the baby. She teaches him how to spoon mushed food into his mouth and wipe at the dribble. He can haul Kíli across the room from the fireplace to the table, arms trembling under the strain. She’s worried at first, but Fíli is nothing but excited for the responsibility. There’s a closeness between them that Dís can’t even understand. He feeds and clothes his brother with an almost grim determination. Fíli sees how small and vulnerable Kíli is, with his blind, judgeless love. He shields Kíli from the monsters, real and imagined, that reach out at his feet. He is guardian and protector, never leaving his brother for a moment and Kíli stares at him with adoration, reaching for his blonde curls, grasping them tightly and refusing to let go.

Thorin comes home one afternoon to see Fíli washing his brother in a large copper tub before the fire. There’s more playing than bathing; Fíli has taken off his clothes and joined the toddler, Kíli leaning against his chest and splashing his fists in the water. He watches as Fíli wraps his arms tightly around that bony little chest, tickling his brother and making him squeal and thrash.

There are tears in his eyes; he dabs them away before scolding his nephews for getting water all over the rug, and fetches them a towel.

-

A raven arrives in the spring, his leg tied in a blue ribbon, braided with gold. There is an odd expression in Thorin’s face when he sees it. He goes tense, his eyes lower and he leans over, hands on the table.

“Greeting Thorin, son of Thráin.” The raven croaks, perched on the edge of his mug. “I bring tidings from Dain, son of Nain.” Her hands wrapped around a mound of dough, Dís stills. Fíli sits before the fire with his brother and half a dozen toys, retelling Thorin’s stories in gabbled fragments. Kíli waves his thin little arms and laughs, reaching for the carved figures.

“Dain is most pleased to announce his wife Svána is with child.” Fíli’s Khuzdul is clumsy and he only understands half of the raven’s speech. But Thorin and Dís know every word. They stare at each other, pale. “He wishes to invite Thorin Oakenshield to attend the birth and name-day of the future King of the Iron Hills.” There is no doubt in Dain’s mind that it is a boy.

Fíli looks up at the thump. Thorin has sat down heavily on a chair, his head in his hands. Dís rests her doughy fingers on his shoulder, murmuring in his ear. A low moan comes out, one that makes Fíli’s hands fall still, the wooden toys falling unnoticed to the floor.

-

“Do you ever miss it?” Dís stretches her feet before the fire. “Being – you know, _with_ someone.” She blushes deeply as her secret shame swells inside of her, threatening to come out.

“’Course I do.” Glori’s blackened nails dig at her blocked pipe. “We’re not _made_ to be alone, in the end. Everybody wants to have a good time, while they’re here.” She lifts her eyes, smirking. “A hundred is awful young, to sleep in an empty bed.”

“I’m not giving in to anybody else.” Kíli gabbles, restless and squirming in her arms. “I’m not submitting to anyone else – not ever.” Glori watches her, hands falling still. “I _don’t._ ” She repeats, firm. “It’s not about our laws – I couldn’t give a fig for those.” She grits her teeth, hot with frustration. “And yet – sometimes I wonder...” Dís falls silent.

“You wonder?”

“I wonder if I’m strong enough, alone.” She blinks back the stinging. “I don’t think I am.”

“You are.” Glori is confident in this. She reaches out, giving Dís a cheerful little push on the shoulder. “The first few years are always the hardest. But it’s better in the end.”

“But it never goes away.”

“We’re flesh and blood Dís. And we’re built for one thing.” She remarks, looking almost uncomfortable. “But you’re made from stronger stuff. You’ll be fine. You don’t need anyone.”

-

Dís watches him go, standing in the sunlight at the entrance of their home. Kíli hangs off her hip, eyes wide and dark. Fíli holds onto the edge of her skirt, waving goodbye.

Thorin will not allow himself the luxury, but Balin looks back for a moment, sunlight catching the silver threads glinting in his beard. He looks at her, smiling, and turns his eyes to his brother. Dwalin merely bows his head in a silent nod. They stand, former lovers, a little apart, unsure of what to say. Fíli starts to whine, tugging impatiently at her skirt. It’s a long time before either one of them can bring themselves to leave, basking in the sunshine, breathing in the air before returning below the stone.

“They’ll come back.” Dís rests her chin on Kíli’s head. Dwalin misunderstands her tense silence. “They can take care of themselves. The wild’s not what it was, Dís.” She stares out across the foothills, where Thorin and Balin disappeared across the rocks and into a steep valley.

“I know the wild better than you.” Her voice is hard. Dís will not concede to him, not for a moment. She combs her fingers through Fíli’s hair, rocking Kíli gently from side to side. Speaking to Glori has lit a new fire inside of her, one burning with determination. “We crossed the _world_ Dwalin. All three of us.”

-

But she knows he will return to his cold, lonely home without his brother, sitting by himself in the darkness, when they retreat into the mountain. It stings in her chest, to think on that. So Dwalin takes Thorin’s place at the table, drinking from his mug and eating from his plate. Fíli chews silently, staring up at the great monster across from him with wide eyes. Dís sits with Kíli on her knee; he smears mashed carrots all over his face and reaches for Dwalin with sticky orange fingers.

The evening passes for Dwalin like a beautiful dream. He sits before the fire with Fíli on the rug, telling his own stories with the little wooden toys while Dís puts the toddler to bed. They’re similar to Thorin’s; they intersect, crossing paths, and Fíli listens with his chin in his hands. He complains when Dís orders him to bed, dragging his feet and talking back and earning a smacked bottom.

And then it’s just the two of them. Dís on her chair, Dwalin on a three-legged stool, staring into the flames, with their bellies full of food and the children wrapped snugly in bed. Dwalin nose-deep in a mug of ale, Dís puffing on a cherry-wood pipe and staring into the fire. Dwalin sits opposite her, leaning forward on his knees, watching the firelight cast shadows over her face, into the hollows of her eyes.

“I didn’t think you were weak.” It’s plagued him, her cold, thoughtless jab. He’s terrified of jeopardizing that hard-earned friendship, built slowly over the seasons. She watches him drain the last of his ale and reach forward with empty hands, closing around hers. Finger to palm, his touch sends a jolt racing along her skin, her pulse throbbing in her head. “Dís – I think you’re the strongest dwarf that has ever lived.” The pipe lowers from her lips. Not dam. _Dwarf._ She stares, watching him take in a breath of air, shaking his head. “To be here – to come _home_ , carrying your babes inside and out – with nothing but Thrór’s axe and the clothes on your back – Dís, you’re made of better stuff than us.” His voice is soft, reverent. She is an idol to him, a carved deity on a pillar of wood. He gets off his stool and grips tighter, on his knees before her. “You put your brothers, your father and grandfather to _shame_ with your strength.” His hands close around the skin of her wrist, brushing the scar with his thick, marked fingers. “I would give anything-”

“Dwalin.” Her voice breaks through his worship. “Don’t do this.” She tries to pull free, but he won’t let go of her. “Please – we can’t do this. I can’t do this again.” He presses his lips to her scar, shaking, and she feels her heart beating inside of her, marching boots on stone, pounding, moving onward without ever stopping. “I can’t give you what you want.” She wants to. She wants to throw herself on the deerskin beside him, take his clothes in her hands and peel them all away. She’s even not sure if it’s Dwalin she hungers for. She thinks it might be the act itself, the sweat and lust and skin on skin. It’s a hard habit to break. She grits her teeth, steeling herself and wrenching her arm free. His hands tense and close around empty air, a memory. Her skin won’t stop throbbing, where he touched her. Her limbs feel weak.

“Dís-”

“I think you should go.” She sits up straight in her chair, folding her hands in her lap, a Queen. He stares at her, helpless, mouth gaping in wordless shapes. It’s too much – she’s too close, and she’s struggling to hold herself down. “Dwalin – go home.” She draws back, away from him, an echo of his touch racing along her skin. “You can’t do this.”

-

She lies in her bed. Cold, alone.

She wonders if this is all she will ever feel.

Her arm still quivers.

-

 “ _Amad._ Say _Amad_ Kíli.” He’s big enough to stand without being held, sucking on his fingers and staring at her. “ _Amad.”_ She begs, gently running her finger down the side of his face. He should have started talking months ago. Perhaps Fíli was just early. “ _Amad.”_

“Why won’t he say it?” Fíli frowns. “Kíli. _Amad.”_ He leans in close. “ _Amad._ ” Kíli reaches out, grabbing a handful of his brother’s blonde curls with his slimy fingers.

“’mad.” The other hand closes on the collar of Fíli’s shirt. Neither of them are sure if Kíli has learned to parrot them, or if it’s nonsensical baby-talk. But Dís allows a grin of relief to spread across her face, all the same.

-

“Oh Mahal – you’re getting _big!”_

Glori’s face is hollow, and there are shadows under her eyes. But she plasters a grin on her face all the same, bending down to ruffle the boys’ hair. Fíli flattens his curls with a grumble, and Kíli laughs.

“Glori – look.” Fíli pulls his brother to his feet, standing three feet away from him and holding out his arms. “C’mon Kíli. Walk.” Kíli looks down, unsure, wobbling as he takes half a dozen tentative steps before collapsing into the blonde’s waiting arms.

“Oh, well done!” The smile grows. Dís’ own expression darkens, watching as the dam lowers herself into her chair, reaching for the pipe. “How about you and Kíli walk together outside? See if you can find cave-beetles.”

“All right.” Fíli holds his brother clumsily, staggering. Kíli babbles, grabbing a blonde curl and stuffing it into his mouth. “Ew, Kíli! _”_ Both mothers smile, watching Fíli wobble across the dim little room and disappear outside.

“At least they like each other.” Glori breathes out a cloud of blue smoke, closing her eyes. “Dori and Nori can’t even stand to be in the same _room_ y’know. Always at each other’s throats about this and that-”

“What’s wrong.” Dís’ voice is cutting. Glori’s eyes snap open, and she sits up. “Don’t lie to me Glori. Something ails you.” Her hands stretch out, finding Glori’s knee. “Are you sick? Just tired? Tell me – please.”

“Nothing gets past you, does it Dís.” She groans. “And here I was, wondering how I was going to tell you.”

“Tell me what?”Dís feels her heart start to race; she’s on the edge of her seat, bracing herself for the worst. “What’s happening?”

“I’m pregnant.” Her voice is low and blunt. “I thought at first that maybe I’d finally stopped bleeding for good, but-“ Glori pulls the skirt tight across her stomach, showing the little lump of her belly, hard and round, sticking out of her soft flesh. “Can’t mistake that.”

“Oh _Mahal.”_ Dís presses a hand, unable to stop the earth from wheeling beneath her feet. “Did – did you start working again? I thought you said Nori-”

“I didn’t take pay.” Glori lowers her chin, but her eyes are still fixed on the trembling figure across the table. The effect is chilling. Dís quails under her dark stare, feeling like a scolded dwarrow, lectured by a matron. “I’m not decrepit Dís. Not yet.”

“But –” She shakes her head, she does not understand. “Everything you said – about husbands and fathers – and how they were worthless.” Dís runs her fingers through her hair. “You said you didn’t _need_ them. You said you didn’t need anybody.” She feels _betrayed._ The thought the two of them had banded together, two dams against the world, opening their hearts to each other and refusing to let anybody else touch them again.

“It happens, Dís.” She shrugs, not really knowing what else to say. Glori doesn’t know how badly this has hurt Dís. She doesn’t realise just how much the younger dam had looked up to her, holding her apart, weathered and tobacco-stained, a shining example that _she didn’t need anybody else to be strong_. “I’m not _made_ of stone.”

Dís grits her teeth, fighting back the tears as the words clamour inside of her throat, roaring in her head.

_I thought you were._

-

She trusts Fíli well enough now, to leave the two alone. They’re asleep, both in the same bed because Kíli’s started crying in the night if he wakes up and his brother is not there beside him. Nothing bad can happen to them, she tells herself. They won’t notice her disappear for a little while.

She’s done fighting. Dís doesn’t feel disgusted, anymore. She feels broken down and defeated. It was a useless fight from the beginning, one she was never going to win. She was made of flesh and blood, in the end. Not stone. She was alone, _completely_ alone, the tide has turned against her and she knows it is over. She wasn’t strong, in the end. The shame makes her hands quiver as she wove her hair into old, familiar braids, working by touch and feel. She dresses almost ceremoniously. She wonders if this is how warriors feel, when they prepare for a battle they know will kill them.

Dwalin shrinks away, when he sees her standing on the threshold of his house. He staggers back, eyes fixed on her. She closes the door and locks it, fingers slim and deft on the battered metal.

“Dís-”

“Hush.” She whirls to face him. The breath dies in his throat as he realises she’s braided her hair the way he used to like it, so, _so_ many years before, the tiny plaits that gather on her throat and trail along her back. She wears her best dress of embroidered blue, a thin chain of silver glints at her throat. Dís reaches out, pressing a finger to his lips. “Don’t speak.”

His knees weaken. She kisses him, holding onto his arms, feeling a groan of surprise spill against her lips, his breath hitching. His skin trembles, so close to hers. It deepens; her hands slide up his back, over his loose tunic, up to his neck, cupping the back of his head. He’s soft, compliant in her hands. She moulds and kneads him, placing his hands on the front of dress. His thick fingers stumble, they falter on the fastenings. He’s clumsy, he doesn’t know what to do. She has to guide him, murmuring in his ear as she retreads a half-forgotten, but achingly familiar path.

She leads him by the hand to his bed, a small alcove in the stone behind a thin curtain. It’s left hanging open, the light of the fire staining their skin red. His hands are shaking madly; there are tears in his eyes as he pulls her dress apart, gently tracing his fingertips over her flesh. His feather-light touch trembles.

She guides him through all of it, in the end. Like leading the steps of a dance, she takes his wrists, placing them on her. She lays him down and envelopes him; they both cling to each other, choking, gasping for air. It’s slow and soft and nothing like her husband. She’s glad for that.

Dwalin can’t stop kissing her afterwards. He presses his lips to her temple, her cheek, her brow, her neck; every inch he can reach, lying with his arms around her. She looks down at his hands, marked with blue, strong enough to crack stone and bend steel, callused and hardened from a hundred years of labour and battle. He holds her as though she was made of glass, trembling with a newfound, tender gentleness.

She lies in his arms and knows she has made a terrible mistake. But she can’t stop – she _can’t_ , and she closes her eyes and waits for the rushing in her ears to fade.

-

“You’re looking pinker.” Her stomach swells before her; Glori rests a hand on the stretched skin. Her cackle is dry, scraping against her ears. “Don’t lie to me Dís. I know that look.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She mumbles, staring down at her hands. Her skin feels cold, shivering with an imaginary breeze. But she does. She wonders if she’s been seen, or he has, sneaking in and out of each other’s houses at night, if their secret smiles weren’t so secret after all. Maybe it really is just written that plainly on her face.

“Dwalin, I’m guessing.” She’s still puffing away on that awful black pipe. “I always thought he’d be good for a tumble, y’know. Big, strong hands. _Never_ visited one of us. Not once. He’d be the only unmarried one, I reckon. Well – him and his brother.” She winks. “And yours, of course.”

“Stop it.” She looks up with glimmering eyes. She doesn’t mind this coarse sort of talk, not usually. But Dwalin has a special place in her heart – he’s not brutish or arrogant like the rest of them. Glori doesn’t deserve to utter his name on her stained lips. “Just – just _stop_ talking about him.” She grips the edge of the table, as though she’s standing on a precipice, about to fall. “You don’t – you don’t know _anything_ Glori.” Her hand curls into a fist.

“I wasn’t girl, calm down.” She frowns. “I’m not going to judge you for wanting to warm your bed-”

“That isn’t what this is.” Dís is holding back sobs and her throat burns with the effort. “One _day.”_ A ghost of a whisper rattles in her throat. “One damned _day_ and _none_ of this would have ever happened!” It rises, and breaks. Her fist crashes against the wood. “It was supposed to be him!” She’s trying to justify her actions, as though her infidelity is some course of destiny. “I was supposed to marry _him!”_

“Dís-”

“We _are_ cursed.” She rises to her feet. “Us – all of us, we’ve all suffered. Thrór is dead and Thrain and Frerin too.” Dís starts to pace, breath tearing in her throat. “Thorin lives in self-inflicted suffering because he is _terrified_ of his own heart. And I – I had to marry a _monster.”_ The tears turn the fireplace into a glowing orange blur. “And he won’t leave.” Glori watches her, lips pursed around her pipe. “I still dream about him – I still think I can hear his voice.” She moans. “I see Fíli out of the corner of my eye and my heart fills with dread because for a horrible moment, I think it’s _him.”_ Her eyes are bright, bright as stones. “But Dwalin – he drives it back. I feel –when I’m with him I feel like I can _breathe._ He makes me happy Glori – like nobody else does.” She sinks back into the wobbly chair, shaking. “I feel – every day, like I’m living someone else’s life – I’m being a sister and a mother and the wife of a ghost. It’s – it’s as though I’m paying off a debt – like I owe people, just for existing. And Dwalin – he doesn’t take anything from me. He doesn’t _ask_ anything of me. He just loves me.”

“And just this once – I just wanted something that was _mine_.”


	2. Faith and Grace

“I trust your journey was uneventful?”

There’s a curl in the edge of Dain’s lip, whether intentional or not, Thorin does not know. He only nods silently, walking beside his cousin in the vast, empty passageway connecting the royal quarters to the feast-hall, the court, the library. Thorin is scrubbed and washed and dressed in soft blue. Dain has given him a crown of carved silver, heavy and ceremonious. It’s very old, it’s tarnished and the edges are beginning to wear away. Thorin wonders where the King dug it up. He doesn’t like the weight on his temples, dragging his head down if he allows his neck to fall slack. He finds himself always having to keep his shoulders back and head up, straight-backed and proud. Perhaps this is why Kings always looked so regal and put-together. Thorin wishes he could take it off, step out of these itchy clothes and change back into his worn cloak. This feels like a bad costume, ill-fitting and too bright. The servants bow and call him ‘King Thorin’ and he’s sure he detects an edge of sarcasm, in their voices.

“Had a little trouble with a pack of Wargs at the foothills of the Misty Mountains, but we made it through.” They travelled light, Thorin and Balin. His companion isn’t quite as young as he used to be, but Balin is still tough and quick. Thorin trusts no other with his life. “You must be excited, my cousin.” Thorin speaks with caution, casting little side-long glances at Dain, looking for clues.

“Aye.” He beams. “The joy – you cannot _begin_ to fathom, Thorin.” Thorin remains silent. “Any day now, we shall have a new son of Durin to call our own.” Dain breaths in the air of his kingdom, arching his neck to take in the magnificence of the carved stone pillars stretching away into the darkness. “He will be worthy of the honour bestowed upon him.”

It’s a dig at Fíli, although Thorin can’t quite untangle it. He only keeps that small, stiff smile stuck to his face, eyes remaining cold and clear as he listens to his cousin ramble, with his head held high to stop the heavy crown from falling over.

-

Nori won’t stop pacing.

He walks back and forth in front of the fire, his reddish-brown hair on end. He’s thin and awkward and gangly, all hands and elbows and feet. His beard is a fluffy little scrap on his chin, thin and soft and too short to braid. Nori mutters to himself as he pauses, chewing on a thumbnail.

They all hear the moans of pain. Fíli holds his brother close, eyes widening with fright at the sound. It’s a low, guttural sound, one drifting on the edge of his memory. Nori is pale; he shakes his head and resumes the pacing, hands balled into fists at his side. Kíli pulls at a blonde braid, giggling.

“Nori – are you all right?” He stops then, head jerking up. Fíli licks his lips, trying to think of something to say. “Don’t be scared – it’s just a baby.” Nori’s stare is hard and relentless. “Mama’s have them all the time, it’s not-”

“Glori’s too old.” He resumes his pacing, raking his fingers through his hair. It’s wilder than ever, sticking up in odd places and falling out of a half-formed braid. He looks like he hasn’t slept in a long time. “She’s too old for this – she’s almost two hundred. _Mahal_ , that _stupid_ dam!” He kicks out a chair. Fíli draws back, clinging to the squirming little body in his arms. “That – _slut_ – she doesn’t think – she doesn’t – how could she do this to us? To Dori? Am I not enough Fíli? How far will she drag us all down before she _realises_ what she’s doing to herself!” He shouts these words at the fire. The heat is soothing on his face. He draws in a hot breath, and as he turns back, he sees Fíli kneeling on the ground with his hands over his ears. He’s crying.

“Shit – Fíli, no.” Nori throws himself on the rug before the dwarrow. He forgets sometimes, what screaming and violence does to him. “I’m sorry. I’m not mad at you.” Kíli’s winding a handful of golden hair in a grimy little fist, staring up at Nori with wide brown eyes. “Stop crying – _please_ stop crying.” But Fíli backs away from him, sobbing in fear as the sound of Nori’s anger echoes over and over in his little ears.

-

Of course it’s a boy.

Thorin waits with Balin, the sound of Dain’s voice muffled through the stone, waits for Svána to pull a nightshirt on and for the attendants to clean up the blood. They stare at each other, helpless. Both of them know what it will mean, although neither of them will ever dare to say it. Thorin has taken off the heavy crown; it sits in his lap now, and he turns it over and over in his hands, the dull silver looking dirty and grey.

His fingers are shaking; he fumbles and the crown slips. Thorin jerks forward, he screws up his eyes as the metal clangs to the stone, the sound deafening against his ears. It’s a crash, steel-on-rock. It sounds like battle.

-

“It’s a little boy, Glori.”

Is that disappointment in her eyes? Dís clings to the ageing dam, her lined face sagging in exhaustion. The hand is weak in hers, damp with cold sweat. Across the bed, Dori sits with his head bowed, his own hands clasped together. His head is resting on them. Dís wonders who exactly he is calling to, as he moves his silent lips.

“I wanted a girl.” She’s not ashamed to say it. Glori was never ashamed. She’s bold and brash and doesn’t give a fig for what anybody ever thought of her. Her face is white, white as the sheet draped across her, slick and shining. “One in three, thought the odds in my favour.”

“Don’t be cruel.” Dori’s voice is trembling. The air fills with a weak cry; the midwife bends over a stone basin of lukewarm water.

“What’s the hair?” Her eyes are half-lidded, and she doesn’t react when Dís squeezes her hand.

“Red.” The midwife wraps the infant in a shawl, laying it carefully across Glori’s chest. Her arms are slack, and Dís has to help drape the sweat-sheened limbs across the little bundle of wool. A tuft of auburn hair peeks out, the wrinkle-faced baby pausing in a scream to stare up at the dams. Glori’s lip twitches in a soft, secret smile.

“Oh.” Dori lifts his head, staring down at the little red face. “You forget how small...” Glori’s eyes drift closed. There’s a gasp from the end of the bed, a little scream from the midwife and a scrabbling under the sheet.

There is blood _everywhere._

-

“The future King.” Dain holds the bundle out to his cousin, bursting at the seams with pride. Thorin looks down at the fuzz of black hair, the ice-blue eyes, the little snub-nose.

Dain doesn’t say _where_.

-

Glori is dead by the time they reach the room.

Fíli holds onto his brother, watching in silence as Nori throws himself by the bed and screams. The orphan grabs the bloodstained sheet in handfuls, burying his face in her lifeless chest. Dry, wracked sobs fill the room. Kíli whispers in his ear, hungry and confused.

Dori sits in silence with the little babe in his arms. He’s not crying openly like his brother, but tears stand out plainly on his cheeks. His lip trembles as he stares down at his youngest sibling, trying to place his awkward bony features and uncover the secret Glori took to her stony grave.

Dís still holds on to Glori’s hand. The flesh is turning cold in her fingers. She stares at the ground, dry-eyed, ignoring Nori’s sobs, Kíli’s whining, the crying of the new baby and the midwife’s gabbling apology.

-

She cries that night, in Dwalin’s arms. She presses her face in his chest and rakes her nails along his back, sobbing and sobbing until her voice is hoarse. Her eyes are red and swollen, her nose is running and her hair is unkempt and damp.

_How could she do this how could she leave me alone_

-

Dwalin stays at home with Kíli. Rituals for the dead are long-winded and tedious and he will not stay still long enough.

There aren’t many witnesses to lay Glori in the earth. No husband would be caught dead sparking rumours in her company and no dam would let a tobacco-stained whore poison her own hard-fought position. But the dead were the dead, and respects were to be paid. Nobody knew just where her soul would end up. A couple of dozen dwarves finally make themselves seen, but only Dori, Nori, Dís and Fíli stand close.

She holds on to Nori’s hand tightly, feeling his fingers quiver. Glori’s sallow, waxy face is sunken. It doesn’t look like her. It is a grey mask and Dís doesn’t like to look at it. They bend over the open tomb, whispering their final goodbyes to her before the stone is heaved into place.

Dori hosts the _adûruthjuzur_ in his little restaurant, pushing the lopsided tables together to make a long row of seats. It’s a muted, quiet affair. Most of the mourners leave when the ale runs out.

“That stupid bitch.” Nori’s had a lot to drink, when he thought his brother wasn’t looking. His head is swimming and her hands are numb. “I _hate_ her.”

Dís tries to intercept, but Dori is too quick. He knocks Nori to the floor, shouting at him, hitting him, and although she tries to pry him off, Dori is strong and solid and will not move. Nori hits back, twisting and writhing like an eel. He uses his sharp knees and elbows and even his teeth, spitting barbed insults out as Dori rages and bellows.

By the time she manages to pull them both apart, Fíli is nowhere to be found. All three of them search, worried that he may have run off. It is Nori that finds him in the upstairs apartment, huddled beneath Dori’s bed with his head hidden in his hands.

-

Dís feels her life shuddering to a halt.

She lies in bed, staring at the wall. Kíli tugs at her arm and whines, but she pulls the blankets up around her ears, turning away from him. She can’t face anybody, anything, at the moment. Half of her soul has died, it lies inside that stone tomb.

How many pieces of herself has she dared to give away? Dís clutches at her chest beneath the blanket, as though she would find gaps in her skin, holes where they have drilled inside of her and taken parts of her heart out.

Fíli stares in the doorway, grimfaced. He calls to his mother across the little room, but she does not answer him. Kíli’s hand is dragging at his sleeve; he whispers that he is hungry and Fíli holds him by the wrist, leading his brother into the front room and kneeling before the remnants of last night’s fire.

He burns the porridge. There isn’t the right amount of oats and water and it’s hard and gritty. It’s like eating sand. Kíli keeps his complaints to himself, staring across the table and watching as Fíli pushes the burned porridge from side to side across his bowl, eyes low and dark.

Dwalin comes halfway through the afternoon, blackened and sooty from the forge. His eyes gleam like two embers in his face. Fíli leads him straight to the dark little bedroom where Dís still lies, fingers wound in the blanket.  

“Darling.” His hands are so big. They clasp across her shoulders, rubbing up and down along her arm. He leans in to kiss her, leaving a black smudge on her temple. “Come now, up.”

Her eyes are dull and lifeless. He can see that she’s ashamed of herself, of this weakness. Her fingers are limp as he takes her hands, running his lips over the knuckles and joints. She doesn’t want him. She wants somebody dead.

He cooks a mess of a dinner for the boys, cleans Kíli up after he smears it all over his face. Kíli’s old enough to dress himself but he insists Dwalin change him into his nightshirt. He thinks this is some sort of game. Fíli is quiet, he doesn’t smile when his brother plays up and yanks Dwalin’s beard and gets smacked on the bum. His eyes are pulled in the direction of his mother’s room, when he thinks Dwalin isn’t looking.

He puts them into bed. There was talk of a bunk for Kíli when he was big enough but the two of them happily sleep side by side for now and save the money. He mutters a story, half-hearted and distracted and he can tell Fíli isn’t listening.

“Are you hungry?” Dwain runs the pad of this thumb across her glossy black eyebrow. She has thick, strong brows, Durin’s brows, he reminds himself as he feels the hairs shift under his touch. Women and elf-maidens were said to pluck them into smooth, arching shapes. But hers are as thick as a finger and he thinks them beautiful. She shakes her head, silently. Her eyes are red. He takes off his shoes and shirts, crawling into bed beside her. Dwalin lays still, offering her the choice to take him if she wants it.

She imagines what Glori would say, if she saw her now. Crying and pathetic, leaving her children to be fed and clothed by someone else while she languished in bed and mended a broken heart. _Soft_. She would sneer. _Weak._

No. Dís opens her eyes and stared at the grey wall. She wouldn’t. _All the best things get done in bed._ Glori would declare, baring her teeth with that cheeky little glint in her eye. _We’re born and most of us die in one too. I heard of a King who didn’t get out of bed at all, y’know. Women, food, guests, they were all brought in to him. He held court from his mattress._

It’s comforting, to imagine that tobacco-scrubbed, weathered voice. _Come on Dís. The finest dwarf in Ered Luin lies in your bed and we both know you wouldn’t turn him down for a moment. You don't have to take him. Just let him hold you._ She turns on her other side, facing Dwalin and stretching her fingers out.

-

Fíli dreams of writhing bodies before the fire. There’s the fur – he can _smell_ it, fur and rain and skin. Fíli can feel the sharp hairs like needles against his cheek. He hears the screaming, the low moans, the grunts and sighs. He sees the blonde dreadlocks trail like ragged, twisted ropes of tarnished gold. He sees her heaving, wrestling, her body like a soft white beacon in the firelight, stained red.

He screams. He thrashes and moans, kicking out, punching his fists. Someone is holding him down, he can’t move and Fíli can see the firelight stamped against his closed eyelids. There’s a hand on his face, slim fingers that were soft once but are now hard and callused. She has pinned him to the bed, her fingers shaking around Fíli’s soft little wrists. He’s still caught in the dream, he writhes and moans, he doesn’t recognise his mother’s hand. Fíli arches his back, he screams, his heart pounding in terror and he cannot breathe. There’s a roaring in his head, like a dragon, deafening him, pounding against the stone. She covers his mouth, he chokes and gasps, muffled, tears gushing.

It fades away. The roaring dies in his ears, the dragon returns to his cave and Fíli slumps against the thin mattress. His throat is raw and hoarse; his face is dripping with tears and the sweat has left his nightshirt clinging to his skin. He opens his eyes to see his mother, mouth half-open in horror as she stares down on him. He catches a hulking figure slip out of the room, his brother staring over a bare, tattooed shoulder.

There are no words. Fíli cannot speak, it’s almost like he’s forgotten how. He reaches out, blindly, taking the front of her shirt and gripping her. Dís lies down, curling her soft body around him. They are both cold and sticky and wet, and Fíli won’t stop shaking.

Dís strokes his hair, whispering every word of comfort, every lullaby and soft song that she can think of in his ear, but Fíli remains awake, his body wracked with sobs as violent and cold as a fit, until dawn breaks above the rock.

-

Thorin treads on a knife-edge.

It’s politics and feasts, inspections, meetings, counsels, a clumsy haphazard of everything he has forgotten after fifty years of exile. Balin stands at his side, holding his hand, keeping him on course. Thorin feels at a loose end, soft and useless, lolling from room to room, marching up and down in his fine clothes. He longs to roll up his sleeves and hammer out a blade in the forge, to work on a loose floorboard or help dig a trench. He is convinced his muscles are softening beneath his clean skin.

The name-day ritual beckons. In a month, the babe will be presented to his future subjects, named and given a family-token and probably a circlet of gold too; he is, after all, a prince.

“Will you marry, Thorin?” The question comes out of nowhere for Thorin, one afternoon when the two are inspecting the patrols. They pass down a long row of armoured dwarves, Thorin pretending to be interested.

“Me? No.” Thorin wonders where this is going. He wonders why Dain has chosen to speak now, here, in front of these open eyes and ears. Balin is not here; he has been called off elsewhere and Thorin begins to feel suspicious. “I have no need to marry. I don’t have it in me to take care of a wife, and Thrór’s line is safe in the blood of my nephews.”

“The Ironfist boys?” It’s amazing that Thorin can keep his face as calm and impassive as he does.

“Fíli and Kíli are my sister-sons.” His voice is quick and sharp as a whip. “Fíli is my heir. I have named him my successor, to carry on the crown and throne when I pass from this earth.” He stops short in his walk, staring very deliberately at Dain. He’s learned how to keep his head up and shoulders straight, and the crown rests on his black hair as though has carried the weight his entire life. “He is Thrór’s great-grandson and a fine heir of Durin.”

“Indeed.” There’s a look Thorin doesn’t like. It’s cold and calculating, it makes him feel afraid. The row of guards stretches along before them, their eyes gleaming in helms of iron, their steel razor-sharp. They look to be made of stone in their armour; only their coloured beards, the soft rising and falling of their chest, gives it away.

-

“Be gentle, Kíli.” Dís whispers, holding the squirming child in her lap as Dori holds the baby out. “He’s _fragile,_ do you understand? Don’t hurt him.”

“Yes _Amad.”_ His hair is long now, hanging over his shoulders, unbraided. She can’t hold him still long enough to brush the tangles, let alone weave it into braids, and even Fíli can’t do anything with it. Kíli is a terror – he screams and shrieks and whoops with laughter, a blur of brown hair somewhere around Dís’ knees. He exhausts Fíli, with his constant jumping and playing and running about. He is wild and free and neither mother nor brother would dare to tame him.

But he understands the solemnity of this. Kili is quiet. He holds the soft bundle of cloth, and Dís supports him, looking over his shoulder and down at his dark green eyes.

“You were that small once.” Fíli leans on Dís’ knee, peering at the baby’s face.

“Was not!” His voice is a screech; Dís pinches him in a command to keep quiet. “Ow!” He grumbles, looking down. “He’s funny.” Kíli frowns down at the nameless infant, particularly at his nose.

“Hush.” Dís starts rocking gently from side to side, trying to lull him to sleep. “He does not look funny. He’ll grow into his nose, soon enough.” She smiles. “He’s such a little dear.” Dori sits down heavily, his head in his hands and she tries not to look at him.

“He’ll be called Ori.” Dori’s strained whisper is like a nail in her heart. “Like us. No father... Even if I wanted to I couldn’t.”

“Ori has his brothers.” She tries the name out on her tongue for the first time, tries to smile at the dwarf. There are already threads of silver in his dark hair. He shouldn’t be colouring yet, he’s barely a hundred and fifty. The stress is turning him prematurely grey. “He doesn’t need anybody else.”

 _He’s glad to be rid of me._ Glori’s voice echoes in the back of her mind. _But he doesn't like what I've left behind._

-

The name-ceremony is stupidly lavish. It is a week-long festival of feasts, banquets, shows, tournaments, and games. Thorin tries to enjoy himself, but he finds himself increasingly bitter and morose. Inwardly, he’s counting the cost; the livestock, the cloth for the costumes, the actors and dancers hired to perform. Dain spent more in this week than his own people could hope to earn in a year.

The final night approaches and Thorin is glad it is almost over. He wants to go home, to his warm little house, with Fíli sprawled on the rug and Kíli gabbling in his arms, looking up at him in adoration, with Dís elbow-deep in cooking and washing, her sharp tongue ready to lash out at him. He doesn’t like this wealth and luxury. It stirs an ancient hunger inside of him; he feels himself stretching out towards it, dark and dangerous.

Dain makes Thorin stand at his left hand. Svána stands at his right, and in her arms is the baby. Six months old and chubby, his stone-blue eyes gaze out at the packed feast-hall, dull and cold. He’s said to resemble his mother, with her blunt, potato-shaped nose and round jaw. Thorin feels a stab of pride in his chest, thinking on his Fíli. Even with his blonde curls, he looks as a son of Durin should. Strong nose, strong jaw, strong lips. This infant is soft and doughy.

“My loyal subjects!” His voice rings out, loud and clear. Thorin listens to his cousin in silence, forcing himself to look pleased. He feels like a broken finger, awkwardly sticking out from the rest of the hand. He’s been here too long. He wants to go home. “I present to you, my son, and your future King! Prince Thorin!”

_No._

_No._

_No no no no no no no no this isn’t happening no how could he he can’t do this that slippery bastard no no no no_

Thorin wears a smile as thin and translucent as glass as the Iron Hills erupts in a roar.

-

She finds Nori mumbling in the darkness outside the forge, reeking of ale. He’s taller than her, but Dís is thick and sturdy and she can easily heave his gangly frame in his arms and carry him home.

All he can do is sleep it off. She takes off his shoes and stained tunic, stretching his thin body out on Thorin’s bed.

“You silly boy.” She strokes his hair gently, the wisps of red-brown soft beneath her callused fingers. Nori screws up his face and she thinks that he’s going so scream at her. But instead a sob comes out. And another, and another, and Nori is crying helplessly, pushing his face in the pillow in a vain effort to hide his tears. She lifts him up, that half-grown body, and holds him close. The downy scrap of his beard crushes against her collarbone.

 _Can’t handle his ale. Like his father._ She imagines what Glori would say to comfort him, sitting on the edge of the bed. But it’s blank. Glori’s softness towards her sons was hidden, private. She tries to imagine those heavy, work-roughened hands softly combing through Nori’s hair, like she did now. It doesn’t seem to fit. She seems too loud and coarse and hard for that sort of sweet gentleness. But it must have happened. 

His hands get tangled up in her hair and when he’s asleep she has to unwind them gently, his knuckles white in his intoxicated slumber.

-

“ _Adad_ look!”

Dwalin looks up from the piece of whittling in his hands, unable to breathe. Kíli stands before him, holding out a little cave-beetle. “I found it outside by the woodpile.”

“Put-put it back, Kíli.” Dwalin finally gasps the words out. “Don’t squish it – it could be full of eggs.” The tiny child nods silently and flees the room, cradling the insect in his cupped hands. He sets down the whittling and runs his hands across his face, violent tremors erupting in his chest and refusing to stop.

-

Thorin tears the robes from his skin, seams bursting, turning soft cloth into rags and heaving it far away from himself. He takes the crown, makes to throw it before reconsidering, holding the ancient metal close to his chest.

He sinks to his knees in the rich chamber, shivering in his underclothes as the cheering and laughter and music continues to echo from the feast-hall. His heart is beating madly in his ribcage _Tho-rin Tho-rin_ _Tho-rin Tho-rin Tho-rin._

Betrayal. Treachery. Injustice. Thorin could shout the words as loud as he liked and nobody would ever hear him. Dain would sleep soundly that night, safe in a fortress of gold.

-

“He’ll return soon.” He doesn’t need to utter the name. They both know who he means. Dwalin traces a finger along her bare stomach, drawing shapeless symbols beneath the blanket. “He won’t stand for this. You’re still technically married.”

“He won’t force us apart.” She makes herself sure of that. Mahal – months and months have gone by and Dwalin is yet to even frown in her direction. His love is soft and warm, it leaves her floating in an orb of light. She thought she would find the constant affection tiresome, but Dwalin is as breathtakingly wonderful as ever. She swore she wouldn’t bind herself to another – but how could she for even a single moment expect to abandon _this?_

She isn’t being unfaithful. There is no vow to break. There hadn’t ever been anything. History won’t remember him. It is no secret – not anymore. They have grown careless, in their smiles and lingering touches. But it is no source of gossip, no scandal for Ered Luin. There’s a half-hearted attempt by some dams at outrage but it fades in a few short weeks. Dís and Dwalin are like an old trinket, found abandoned underneath a table or stuck behind a chair, dusted down and polished and put back on the mantelpiece. It was never lost, not really.

“You sound so sure.” His voice is a deep rumble. She sees the blind adoration in his eyes, the way a smile makes his entire face light up, and she knows this is still a dream for him. She is still a goddess in both name and form, and he still worships her, utterly devoted to every fibre of her being. “Thorin is not one for abandoning old laws.”

“Hush.” She takes his face, planting a kiss on his heavy marked brow. She feels his hands on her, thick and broad as hams, rippling with brute strength. He’s more skilled in his touch. Months of training has served him well. He runs his fingers over the cleft of her hip, into the joint of her thigh, curving around. He can’t help himself – who knows how long they will have? He doesn’t share Dís’ brash confidence. He knows this long, delicious sweet night is waning into dawn; the dream is fading away and soon he will be forced to wake up.

But for now, he has the strongest, most beautiful dam that Middle-Earth has ever known lying in his arms. A dark-haired dwarrow that calls him _Adad_ sleeping in the next room. It’s all he ever wanted; and now for a few fleeting moments, it is all his and he can’t care about anything else, at all.

-

Thorin’s biggest fear is that Kíli won’t remember him. Two years have passed, since he left that grey valley without looking back. Kíli will be almost four, nearly the age when he first met Fíli. Four years – it’s been _four years_ since he first walked into that room to find his sister gasping in a rented bed. But he cannot imagine his life without any of them in it.

There’s a thick stew on the fire, filling the room with the rich, heavy smell of gravy. Dís must have anticipated his coming. He wonders if she has been doing this every night, preparing something hearty and warm to fill his aching stomach, left with a half-full pot as she leads her children to bed.

It’s a two-pronged reunion. Dwalin and Balin embrace, press foreheads murmuring secrets to each other in the firelight. Thorin wonders if she will be aloof in their presence, put on airs of propriety. But she flings her arms over him, winds his hair around her hands and holds on to him tight.

Fíli remembers him instantly. He’s halfway between shoulder and elbow, his nose a touch harder. But Thorin still picks him up, thick and sturdy, his broad hands around Thorin’s neck. Kíli lingers back, screwing up his face, trying to place the long dark hair and shining blue eyes. It hurts to look at him. He’s so _small_ , so thin and little, his hair is all over the place and his brown eyes look too big in his face.

“It’s Thorin, Kíli.” Fíli darts forward, taking his brother by the hand and leading him over. “Our uncle Thorin.”

“Thor’n.” Kili repeats the word, mispronouncing it. He comes up to Thorin’s hip. “Thor’n!” The second is one of recognition. He wraps his arms around his uncle’s thigh, hugging him close, pulling out the warm memories of a black-haired dwarf that carried him on his shoulder and sang him to sleep in a low, deep voice.

-

He waits for Dís to send the boys to bed, before calling the others in. They should have used the feast-hall or a meeting-room for something like this, but it is a cold night and Thorin doesn’t want to make a big deal out of this. He and the sons of Fundin collect Oin and Gloin, old Austri, Hónur, Virfir, and Bifur.

They sit around the table, leaning over the mantle, perched on the edge of benches and boards. The oldest and wisest, the most skilled of Durin’s folk, and their new neighbours. The ones he can trust. Dís sits in her chair looking out at her kin. Her subjects. They are all quiet and tense, expecting solemn news from their King.

“I’m sure you’re all eager to hear how it went.” Thorin lowers his pipe. He stands before the fire, looking out at them all. “Dain’s Svána had a little boy in the summer.” He can’t look at any of them as he speaks the next words. Balin dips his dead. “He has named the dwarrow Thorin.”

“Mahal.”

“ _No!”_

“What’s he gettin’ at?”

“The audacity – he wouldn’t _dare._ ”

“That smug, arroant-”

“He got it from Nain. Always said that fellow had bigger ambitions than sense.”

“D’ya reckon-”

“Peace.” Thorin’s voice is loud and clear, and the rest all fall silent. “I was as surprised as you to hear it. He did not inform me before the public announcement, nor did he ask for my blessing.” Dís cannot tear her eyes away from his stormy expression.

“So what will you do?” Bifur, the wisest and strongest of the miners, leans back a little in his stool, an elbow on the table as he regards a King that he claimed as his own. “Did he say outright, what he wanted?”

“Nay.” There’s a muscle twitching in Thorin’s throat. She doesn’t know how he was able to bear it, this silence, for so long. “I know only what he infers.” But that is enough to scare him. It is enough to make all of them frown heavily. It is enough to make Dís’ hands shake. Dwalin reaches out and grabs her shoulder, clinging to her. She wraps her fingers around his wrist. “He does not think us deserving of Durin’s crown.” Thorin spits the words out, oozing disgust. “He does not think Fíli a worthy heir.”

“Because of the Ironfist in him.” Dís breathes faintly. Thorin won’t look at her. He only sighs heavily, pausing to take in her words before continuing.

“I won’t let this happen.” There’s a new note in his voice, hard and resolute. “I won’t let him take the throne from us. We may not have his gold-hoard or his army, but I am Thrór’s grandson.” His eyes reflect the gleam of the fire. “And I will _not_ allow his legacy to crumble beneath Dain’s foot.” Dwalin’s hand tightens on her shoulder, and her spare hand comes up to hold on to him. They’re both too distracted, too upset to consider discretion. And Thorin is too bitterly angry to notice.

“How will you stop him?” Hónur asks from his stool. Thorin’s head jerks up, expression stony.

“Fíli will need all of your help.” His hand tightens around his pipe. “If we work together, all of us, if we teach him what we know, he will be a strong King.” Dís stops breathing. “He needs to be a better heir than this Thorin dwarrow.” She leans into her chair, lip trembling. “He’s a sturdy little lad with a quick head on his shoulders.” Thorin tries to sound confident. “He will learn from all of us.”

-

Dís waits for Thorin to finish, for everybody to leave before she rounds on him.

“How _dare_ you – without asking me?” She leans in, hissing so the boys cannot hear her. “What were you thinking?”

“Dís, this is not negotiable.” He shakes his head slowly, refusing to listen to her. “Fíli will have to do this. Not just for us – for all of Durin’s Folk, don’t you understand? This is his birthright. He is destined to lead us into a new future. You said yourself – he would save us. He was always going to be King. _Always.”_

“He’s too young.” She grabs his sleeve, whispering frantically. “Thorin – he’s _eight_. You can’t leave him alone with those dwarves for hours and hours. It took months to get him just to touch _you_. He won’t be able to do it.”

“He will learn.” There is a hardness in his eyes, one that chills her to the bone. She draws away from him, horror burning inside of her. “He is a Prince. Our Prince. We’ll ease him into it. Just the mornings at first, a few days a week.”

“Thorin please...” Her voice hurts him. He doesn't want to do this either. He dimly remembers his own childhood. _Sit up straight. Stop playing with those silly toys. Pay attention. You'll never kill an orc with a stance like that. How can you give a speech at a feast if you can't conjugate your basic verbs?  Watch what you're doing with that thing. Stop snivelling. You don't want to be like Frerin do you? Faster. Harder. Do it again and no mistakes this time._ The weathered voices of tutors, instructors and his father and grandfather pierce his skull, his head aching with the memories.

"I won't do to him what Thrór did to me." Thorin promises, reaching out and taking her hand. "Have faith in me. I promise Dís."

"You already made a promise." Her voice breaks. She's trembling with helpless rage. Dís is powerless against the will of her King. "And you're breaking it."

 _Chickenshit._ Glori mocks in her ear. _Hit him over the head and be done with it. Don’t let him step on you. Fíli is your son._

But that was the thing. He wasn’t. Dís feels that old, heavy rock fall back onto her shoulders. That was one thing that Glori never understood. How could she – her bastard sons were never _meant_ to be anything. They were born nameless, they came from nothing. They had freedom. But Fíli’s life, it had been mapped out, from birth to death since the moment he was born. It didn’t change, when she left the Orocani’s. The name at the top was merely crossed out, replaced with something else. They don't belong to her, those two dwarrows. They belong to everybody. They're Durin's sons and she's been lucky to have had them to herself for this long.

She stands in the doorway of the little room, watching them sleep. Fíli snores on his back, golden hair spilling over the pillow. Kíli lies curled into his side, twitching in a soft dream. She approaches the pair silently, bending down to kiss her eldest son in the gloom.

“Oh, my baby.” She breathes in Fíli’s ear, feeling the stone sink into her chest, threatening to crush her heart. She wants to disrupt his sleep, hold him tight and never ever let go. “My darling.” Dís lays her head on the pillow, stroking his curls with a fingertip. Her little half-breed, neither one nor the other. Sturdy and reliable as any of Durin's Folk, subdued and quiet, but still burning with a hot flash of Ironfist anger. Fíli could lead them out of this uncertainty, cement his own right to be crowned as King. Or he could destroy them all. Thorin won't understand, Thorin won't listen to her. She listens to them breathe, two brothers who couldn't bear to be apart.

Her lion-cub and her changeling. Stone and glass. Sun and moon. She stretches her arms across them both, fingers brushing cloth and hair and soft, childish skin. _Mahal, protect them both_. She whispers in the darkness.

A prayer of habit rather than meaning. After all - when has their maker _ever_ listened to her?


	3. Crash

“I thought you could use this.” The little sleeping-suit has been too small for some years; she only found it the night before, down the back of the boys’ narrow bed. Dori accepts the gift with a worn, tired smile. The little apartment over his restaurant is cramped – it’s made for a bachelor, a single room with a fire, a table, a bed in the corner. It’s not made for three brothers. “The young ones – are they... all right?”

“As well as they will be.” Ori can sit up all on his own; Kíli is trying to get him to roll a little wooden ball across the rug. “I just _wish_ I knew who he looked like.” Dori rests his chin on a flattened palm. “That nose... I can’t place it.”

“And Nori?” She presses. She never told Dori about how she found him staggering in the darkness, how he held on to her and wouldn’t let go. She’ll never tell anyone.

“Nori is a problem.” Dori slowly admits. “He’s not taking it well.” He sighs. “We never got along. And this damn place – it’s too small. He disappears for days on end, y’know. I don’t know where he goes.” He gives a hopeless shrug. “I can’t do anything with him, when he’s this way.”

 _Nothing wrong with a free spirit._ She can imagine Glori, sticking up for her son. But it’s getting harder and harder to remember her voice and sometimes Dís has to force the echoes in her mind.

-

“No no no – hold it like _this._ ” Hónur grabs his wrist, straightening Fíli’s grip on the hammer. He’s standing over Fíli, too big, too loud. The forge is too hot, it’s too bright, the air is wet and smoky and thick and it’s hard to breathe. “You need to keep control in your fingers, not your wrists, understand?”

“Yes Hónur.” Fíli whispers, unsure if the banging in his ears is a hammer or his own throbbing heartbeat.

-

It’s the winter of Bifur’s accident.

Except it’s not an accident, not really. There is nothing accidental about the way the little pack of dwarves is cornered, the males gored with spears and cleaved with axes. There’s nothing accidental about the bones they of the children they leave behind, to show the search parties there is no hope of salvation and abandon the tough, leathery bodies of the dwarves to the carrion birds.

Maybe it is an accident, of sorts. Because when Dwalin finds the remains of the camp two days later, Bifur’s still breathing, an orc-axe embedded in his skull, and they can’t have meant that, not at all.

-

“I’m not a fool Dís.” Although, perhaps he is. It was Gloin who told him in the end, let it slip out in a thoughtless, offhand comment. He obviously thought Thorin knew. Everybody else did.

“I’m not sorry.” But she can’t look him in the eye, all the same. She stares down at her crooked fingers, the crescents of black at the rim of her nails. “I don’t regret what I’ve done.”

“I know the two of you... I know.” He doesn’t know how to say it. “But Dís – this can’t go on. Not now.”

“You can’t take him away from me.” Her voice trembles. “You _won’t_ – you’re not sending him away again. I’ll fight you Thorin. I’ll fight you and I’ll _win.”_ She looks up finally, her eyes flashing at him and Thorin doesn’t doubt that she would in this cold anger.

“Dís.” He reaches forward, seizing her hands. “I am trying to show the world that we’re still worthy of our crown. I can’t do that if–if–”

“If I’m fucking Dwalin.” He wrenches his hands away, the air still in his lungs. She’s never cursed around him, not ever. Dís won’t back down from him, she won’t lower her chin.

“I know it’s not fair.” Her anger strikes down into his heart. “And I am so sorry – you both deserve this. In another life...”

“Don’t you _dare_ talk to me about fair.” She stands up, the glint in her narrow eyes hardening. “Don’t you dare Thorin. This has _never_ been fair. I lived my life – for _you_ , for Thrór, for our people. I married for gold. I had children. I have done _everything_ you ever needed of me.” Thorin wants to rise to his feet and challenge her, but he remains on the lopsided stool, afraid to move.

“Please Dís-”

“I have suffered enough for you.” She leans over him, crouched like a beast with her teeth bared. “I only ever suffered.”

He doesn’t know what else to say. He knows he’s lost, for now.

-

Fíli wakes panting from his dream. He shakes, screwing up his eyes as he tries to push those images out of his head, and waits for the violent rushing in his head to die down.

Kíli is sitting up, the outline of his tousled hair looking down on him. He feels those little fingers on his cheeks, tracing the wetness and smearing it over his face.

“Fee – are you all right?” Kíli’s thin little voice is barely above a whisper. “You’re crying.”

“I’m fine.” It’s not the first time, for either of them. Kíli’s learned to shake his brother awake when he writhes and moans; and if he starts to scream Kíli pinches his arm and digs his fingers in his side in a desperate attempt to wake him up before Thorin and his mother come rushing in. “Just a bad dream.” Kíli gets them too, but his are of monsters and dragons and orcs; stories that Dwalin and Thorin have told that overexcite his wired imagination and crawl inside of his head. Fíli’s leave him sobbing, straining against Kíli’s soft little hands and he’s wet the bed more than once.

“Lie down.” Fíli pulls him back to the mattress, holding his brother tight as he waits for the screaming in his ears to fade. He’s squeezing too tight; he can hear Kíli panting.

“What was in your dream?” Fíli loosens his constricting grasp; Kíli can feel his hands trembling. One on his arm, underneath him, snaking around, the other on his shoulder. He asks this question all the time, genuinely curious because he’s never that scared when he wakes up from his bad dreams. They barely come; but Fíli is always waking up and shaking, it seems. Always holding on to Kíli and trying not to cry, and he won’t tell anyone else.

“A monster.” He gives the same answer that he always does. And it’s not a lie.

-

Bofur returns, all smiles and upturned braids. Dís invites him over one afternoon and he sits at the table with Kíli pulling curiously at his hat. He has toys for the both of them, a bird and a dragon. They’re little things made of tin. Fíli sniffs that he’s too old for toys, but he takes the dragon, turning the key to make the metal wings fly when he thinks nobody is watching.

It’s frightening, how quickly one’s life can collapse. Dís sends the boys away with their new toys and listens. Because of Bifur’s accident, Bofur was called back to help out around the house, waiting for the inevitable. But it never came. Bifur lived, and as the first month wore out everybody realised that he wasn’t going to die after all. He sat in a chair, silent apart from the occasional mumbling of ancient Khuzdul that nobody understood. He left behind a mother, a widowed sister and four nieces, there was only one thing that Bofur could do to help his family.

“But you were so close – only three more years and you would have made Journeyman.” Dís feel sick with empathetic guilt. Bofur can only shrug. “And Súna?”

“Broke the engagement last week.” Dís aches for him. “She’ll marry a Master Smith, but not a common miner.” His Adam’s apple bobs in his throat and Bofur isn’t smiling anymore. “It’s for the best. Family means more than some dam.” Neither of them believe what he’s saying is true. It’s lip service.

-

 “Lift your hands. Don’t let anyone get access to your chest or neck.”

“Yes Dwalin.” Fíli grits his teeth, listening to the dwarf talk. Dwalin stands before him, a wooden sword in his hand. Both are stripped down to loose trousers. Fíli is short and stout, a little boulder. Dwalin is a scarred, weathered mountain.

“You need to ground yourself. Imagine you’re a tree, dug in the earth. Your feet are the roots. Your arms are the branches. The branches move in the wind, but the roots always remain still. You must keep your stance up and make it impossible for your foes to knock you down.”

“Yes Dwalin.” Fíli’s brow is creased in a little frown, and the training sword in his hand is trembling. He hopes Dwalin cannot see it, his fear. He looks up at the ageing warrior, raising his shoulders. “I’m ready.”

Dwalin knocks him down in seconds. Fíli tries to block his attack, but in doing so, his ankle turns. Spying the weakness, Dwalin hooks under his leg and sends him to the ground. Fili gasps in pain, the sword clattering from his hand. The stone is cold against his bare arms and back, and he tries to tell himself that is why he is shivering.

“Like a tree, Fíli.” Dwalin shakes his head. “Get up.” He’s firm in this. He needs to be. Thorin is insistent when it comes to Fíli’s training. No one is to go soft on him. No one is to play favourites. Orcs and Wargs won’t go easy on Fíli for being a prince. Dain will not allow weakness to take the throne.

“Can we stop.” On his knees, Fíli looks up. He’s exhausted, sweat drenches his golden braids and he’s going to wake up covered in bruises. “I’m tired Dwalin. I want to go home.”

“Not yet.” But Dwalin offers his wrist, Fíli taking it in both hands and hauling his sturdy little frame up. “You haven’t even landed a blow on me today.” He looks at the blonde, guilt ripping him apart. Dís would spit on him for this. “You’re not scared of hurting me, are you?” He wonders if that’s it. He’s seen the way Fíli holds the sword away from himself, like a red-hot brand, a flaming torch that could burn him. There is a disconnect between the little prince and his weapon. “You can’t hurt me Fíli. Imagine I’m somebody else, if you like. Imagine I’m an orc or a monster.”

“A monster.” Fíli repeated, licking his lips. He’s not afraid of orcs and dragons and wolves. He’s seen an orc before. He remembers listening to it squeal as _Amad_ cut off its legs with her axe and watching the foul creature drag its bleeding body along the rocks. Dragons are only toys and pictures. He can’t imagine something to small and insignificant hurting him. There’s only one monster in his mind. Only one being that truly inspires fear.

He imagines it now. Golden waist-length dreadlocks and wild blue eyes and screaming, screaming screaming. _You stupid bitch – leave me alone –  I’m going to fucking kill you – you think you can trick me – I’ll show you what it’s like to hurt – You useless excuse for a mother – Fíli you watch this you see what happens when stupid dams think they can tell us what to do – You like that you like what you’re doing – Tell Thorin see if I give a fuck – no one will ever come for you – you’re mine you and Fíli and you’ll never leave me–_

He can’t see anything, it’s all red and rushing and his face feels hot. There are tears on his face and for the first time Fíli knocks the wooden sword out of Dwalin’s hands. The dwarf beams at him and holds out his hands but Fíli drops the weapon and runs away, far far as far as he could with sobs tearing from his throat, looking over his shoulder as though he will see a tall figure with blonde dreadlocks running behind him.

-

He has a terrible nightmare. Kíli has to push the pillow over his face to muffle the screams because he doesn’t know what else he can do. He’s bewildered, and afterwards he cries, hugging Fíli close even though his nightshirt is saturated and smelly and clinging to his legs. Fíli pushes his tears back and tries to smile for his baby brother even though he still can’t breathe.

That morning Kíli pretends that he was the one who wet the bed. Dís clicks her tongue and teases that she might have to get him a diaper if he does it again. Kíli grins across the table in a secret conspiracy when his mother turns her back. Fíli eventually smiles back, looking like a ghost.

-

 “I’m sorry Dwalin.” There are tears pouring down Dwalin’s cheeks and he cannot hide them. He doesn’t try. He lets them fall, making his beard soggy. “But I need you to do this for me. For Fíli. For Ered Luin.”

“You are my King.” Dwalin blinks and feels the wetness slide down his face. “I live to serve you and follow your commands.”

Even when they break his heart.

-

“Do you think it’s time to try again?”

Dwalin won’t train Fíli again. He refuses. He doesn’t want to put the little dwarrow through more of that agony. Thorin takes it on himself to fill in the gaps until Dwalin is ready again. He works on stances and forms, exercise drills and tests of strength. He knows better than to put another sword in Fíli’s hand.

“No.” Fíli stares down at his boots and he’s plainly embarrassed. Thorin crouches before him, looking up because his nephew is getting taller and taller these days, hugs him close and Fíli breathes in. It smells of sweat and leather and iron-grease. “I’m sorry.” He mumbles the words, feeling Thorin cup the back of his head.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of.” Bitter rage and hatred and disappointment flood his thick voice. Thorin pushes down his terror but he can’t stop thinking about his nephew who can’t hold even a toy weapon at the age of nine. He’s already terrified of failure and it’s barely begun.

-

Dwalin meets her at an underground cave-pool, late at night when the others are all asleep. She wears her nicest undergarments and makes sure to wear a dress that covers her neck. He’s sitting with his legs crossed by the water, a single torch glimmering in his hand.

“Dwalin.” She greets him with a kiss, her hands sliding inside his shirt. It’s getting harder and harder to see him now. She knows Thorin doesn’t approve, she can’t bring him in the house and flaunt it about, and Dwalin’s shared home is too small and open for such secrets. They have to snatch moments of solitude, like young unwed lovers. They are still young, she reminds herself as her fingers brush the hairs on Dwalin’s skin. She feels his thick muscles tense like knotted ropes beneath her fingers, and he closes his eyes.

“No.” And all of a sudden, his hands are on her wrists, pulling her away. He straightens the front of his clothes and he turns away from her, shoulders hunching over. He looks so small. “Dís – I can’t do this. _We_ can’t do this.”

Her world breaks apart.

-

She doesn’t remember walking back home. She doesn’t remember crying or beating her hands against anything, but she jerks out of what feels like a daydream, standing in the threshold of her own room with her face wet, with her knuckles bruised and bleeding and her chest heaving with gasps of air.

“Thorin!” She snarls like a beast. Dwalin is gone – she left him, hunched over on the rock to bleed out alone. “You _bastard!”_ He’s sitting on the wood-box before the fire, smoking. He looks like he’s expected this. Her birdsong voice rises to a pained screech, and her hands are on the front of his clothes, pulling him up, screaming and screaming in his face. “You selfish arrogant _bastard_ how could you do this to me _how dare you!”_

“Dís–” His choked voice is as soft and small as a raindrop on the red-hot iron of her heart. She shakes him, pushing him away and Thorin reels against the sideboard.

“ _Damn_ you and your crown!” She hits him, hard. There is a heavy strength in her shoulders and arms. Thorin is winded. “You’re destroying us – how can you do this to me! How can you do this!” She doesn’t see the wide-eyed figure in the doorway to the bedroom. “Why can’t you let me have one thing! Just one damn thing!” Winded, Thorin reaches out for her, trying to catch her arms. “I have done _everything_ for you and you give me _nothing.”_

“Dís _stop_.” He’s bigger than her, and once the initial shock is over, he grasps her wrists, trying to force her arms to her side. “Please stop-”

“Don’t _touch_ me!” She pulls free, beating her fists against his chest. “Don’t you _dare_ try Thorin! No! Let me _go!”_ He pins her against the wall, knees against her thighs, hands pressing into her shoulders. He doesn’t want to hurt her. He tries not to hurt her. He only wants her to be quiet, to stop writhing. It’s nails in his heart, to hear her pain. She screams and howls, fighting against him, a trapped wildcat. “Stop this!”

“No!” And there’s a flash of pain in Thorin’s arm. It’s sharp, sharper than Dís’ nails and teeth and he gasps aloud in surprise. “Get _off_ her!” Fíli snarls, pushing at his uncle, and Thorin staggers back, unable to breathe. There’s a fork sticking out of his arm, embedded deep in his flesh. Dís leans heavily against the wall, gasping for air and Fíli stands in front of her with his fists raised. “ _Don’t_ _touch her!”_

Thorin stands weak-kneed before his sister and nephew. The three are all silent apart from heavy, ragged breathing. Fíli’s trembling fists will not lower and he pulls his lips back in a snarl. Dís winds her arms around her eldest, pushing her face into his hair and stroking his blonde curls until he collapses, clinging to her and refusing to let go.

-

She bandages Thorin’s arm in the firelight. It’s deep but small and Thorin will not lose more than a few days of labour. He will not look at her, and she keeps her eyes lowered on her work.

She checks on the children one last time that night. Fíli took a long time to calm down, and eventually Dís had to force a mouthful of thick liquor down his throat, rubbing his back as he coughed and sputtered. Kíli, who had been hiding under the bed the whole time, stared from beneath the blankets. They sleep soundly now, back to back with their hair mingling on the pillow.

Dís wonders if she was selfish, as she lies in bed. It frightens her, that flash of anger. She presses a hand over her chest, waiting for her heart to slow. She wonders if it will ever beat normally again.

-

Thorin moves out. It’s for the best. He takes an empty one-room house that used to belong to old Hróthun. Dwalin and Gloin help him move his few things and leave him in the evening.

Thorin eats a cold dinner and lies beneath a single blanket. In his shame and failure, he can’t help but cry. He knows he’s lost the ones he loves most of all and he doesn’t know how he can ever get them back.

-

“How is your mother?” Dwalin returns to training Fíli. It’s the one last link he has to Dís now. He takes it easy, putting Fíli through a few drills and then sitting down with him.

“Sad.” He’s honest. “Sometimes I have to give Kíli breakfast ‘cause she’s not up yet. She doesn’t laugh or smile anymore and she said Kíli gives her a headache.” He lifts his eyes. “Can you come back? Please?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Dwalin murmurs. “Not yet.” He rubs Fíli on the arm, forcing a smile.

-

 _Pathetic. Weak._ There’s the Glori she knew. Dís squeezes her eyes shut, listening to the dam’s voice echo in her head. _So what, Thorin says no. Fuck Thorin._

“It’s not just that.” She whispers to the ghostly voice. “Dwalin won’t disobey him. He’s too loyal.” She stares up at the ceiling, at the familiar rock. “It’s over.”

Would she have gotten this deep, if she could foresee this? Would she ever have approached him, if she knew he would tear her apart, would leave her so broken and empty after filling her soul? Was it worth it? Four, no, five years of love, was it worth it, to nurse this agonizing pain in her heart?

She didn’t just use him for his body. She didn’t use him as revenge against her husband. He wasn’t simply a tool for her. She _loved_ him, passionately and exclusively. His adoration and his devotion had filled her with a sense of completeness she hadn’t known before. She felt happy – not a tentative, accepted kind of happy she felt in the Orocani’s. Really, truly, _wonderfully_ happy, as though the cosmos had aligned and she never had to fear a thing again.

How could one person have such an effect on her? She didn’t realise how deeply she had fallen, until it was all ripped away. She grits her teeth, running her fingers over the scar on her wrist. She aches with regret.

-

“Nori, what’s fucking?”

They’re down in the clutch of trees nestled amongst the foothills. It is a cold, winter’s morning, the breath fogs silver before them and their fingers tremble in the air. The chestnuts cluster at their feet; Fili holds his tunic out, collecting dozens of them against his chest.

“Where’d you learn that from?” Nori’s cold fingers close around a chestnut, taking aim at the bird’s nest in the tree, fifteen feet up and across the clearing. He’s too old to be doing this, really. “You been eavesdropping again.”

“Sorta.” Fili watches the chestnut fall short. He’s twelve years old and no longer innocent. He’s been listening in to things he shouldn’t, hiding under tables and around doors. He has an idea, in his mind, but he needs to be sure. “So what is it?” Nori takes another smooth nut, drawing his arm back to his ear.

“We-ell.” He fires. Missed again. “You’ve seen your Ma before without any clothes on, right?” Fili’s heart grows cold and sick, knuckles whitening, twisted in the cloth. He certainly has. His blonde curls bob as he nods, silently. “Well... Y’know... What we have.” He gestures awkwardly between his legs before reaching into the clutch of chestnuts. “Dams don’t.”

“I know that much.” There’s a heavy frown on his face. He stares across the grass, pale and tipped with frost. Their footprints have left a winding trail, circling, doubling back as they gathered the chestnuts in the spreading winter. “So how does it work?”

“Well... They fit together.” Nori bites his lip, throwing the nut with all the strength he can muster. He misses by two feet, but he’s getting closer. Inside her nest, the starling’s screech rises into the soft, grey air. “Y’sorta go... _in_ her, if that makes sense.” His face is red, and it’s not entirely from the cold. Fili expression is still, he picks the awkward, stumbling explanation slowly in his mind. After several moments of icy silence, another failed attempt at dislodging the bird’s nest, he turns to look at the taller dwarf.

“And then you have a baby?”

“Course you do.” Nori grins wickedly, reaching into Fili’s folded tunic. “And if you’re lucky, the one who put it in might even stick around long enough to see the whelp grow up.” The branch rattles; Nori is getting closer.

“Does it hurt?” Fili’s voice is very soft. It makes Nori’s arm lower, makes him turn, look down at him with a frown knitting his dark eyebrows.

“Fili?”

“When he does it, does it hurt?” His voice is soft, but everything else is tense. Nori stares, mouth half-open as he watches Fili wrestle deeply with his heart. He blinks and tears ooze down, plain against his pinched red cheeks.

“I dunno... I guess sometimes, maybe.” Nori shrugs. He does know, he’s not an idiot. Fili drops his hand; the chestnuts tumble from his tunic, hammering on the ground, soft thumps against his legs and feet. Fili’s teeth are set, his eyes cold and dark. His fist trembles around a single, remaining chestnut. Nori is silent, watching Fili’s sturdy arm rear back. The nut flies from his hand with a choked sob, tearing from his raw throat.

The air is filled with screeching, with beating wings, as the bird’s nest tumbles slowly from the spiky, naked branch, turning over and over; three precious eggs are lost to the frost-bitten ground.

-

“When’s _Adad_ coming back?”

Dís goes white, looking down at her youngest son, dressed and ready for bed. Fíli busies himself in his book.

“ _A-Adad?”_ She whispers. Kíli nods, all messy brown hair and wide, curious eyes. “Kíli who do you mean.”

“Y’know. _Adad._ ”

“He means Dwalin.” Fíli finally looks up from the page as Dís clamps a hand over her mouth. She glares at him, eyes flashing. She bundles Kíli off to bed without another word and when she comes back, Fíli sets down his book, looking at his knees.

“Fíli how could you let him do that?” She hisses. “Spreading lies. What if Thorin heard Kili call Dwalin his _father_?”

“Don’t look at me like that.” He looks up, challenges her with a dark blue stare. “Don’t blame _me_ for this. You didn’t tell him the truth so he’s only filling in the gaps.”

-

It all makes sense in his mind. He lies awake, listening to Kíli breathe slowly beside him, face nuzzled into his shoulder as though Fíli could protect him from the cold. Fíli mouths words to himself, staring through the darkness at that stone ceiling he knew loomed out of his reach. He thinks about how his mother only started growing as they left the mountain range, how she would lie with her hands on her stomach, tears leaking across her face, how she would hold Kíli with a vague distant look in her eyes, a stiffness in her limbs that left the muscles straining underneath her skin.

Fíli cries quietly, because he doesn’t want to believe it. He doesn’t want it to be true. He can see the vague shapes against his eyelids, wide blue eyes and bare limbs red in the firelight. He can hear her screaming, even now, breaking into heaving sobs, crying until she cannot breathe. Fíli reaches out, his arms close around that skinny body with too much hair, and he drags Kíli up onto his chest. His brother murmurs, but does not wake. The tears sting his eyes, he can feel the convulsions rising in his chest and it takes every ounce of strength to keep quiet.

Kíli sleeps, blissfully unaware. Fíli holds on, afraid to let go.

-

Nori is gone. He’s caught trying to steal from a market-stall and manages to get away but everybody knows to be on the lookout for him now. Dori wrings his hands and mutters that it’s been going on for a while now, he always suspected it, and when the guard searches Nori’s corner in the one-room apartment they find a sewn-up hole in his rolled mattress. They tear it open and handfuls of clasps and rings spill out.

Dís takes Ori for a few days while Dori tries to sort everything out. He’s a good little boy, quiet and thoughtful. Kíli is seven, louder and gigglier than ever before. He leads Ori about the house by the hand, the little four-year-old stumbling in trousers too big for him, following with soft wide eyes.

Dori refuses a hot drink and instead downs a mug of ale. She sends the little boys away with a few copper coins to terrorise the marketplace. After several moments it all spills out. His house is being watched, patrols are in place and there’s a price on his Nori’s head. There’s nothing Dori can do, no bribe or bail he can afford to keep his brother free. He can only hope that Nori is already far away.

Dís can’t give words to Glori. She doesn’t know what the dead dwarrowdam would have to say about this.

-

He’s not far away, actually. Not yet. He slips in late at night, where Fíli, Kíli and Ori sleep huddled up like a litter of pups. Ori squeals with excitement and Nori presses a finger over his lips, telling his little brother to hush.

“Where will you go.” Fíli has heard the scandal which has rocked Ered Luin. It’s all anybody can talk about. He was pulled away from his lessons yesterday, questioned for some hours about Nori until Dwalin burst in and hurried Fíli away.

“I dunno. Somewhere East.” Ori sits in his lap, grabbing at his thin beard, too short and sparse to braid yet. Fíli watches the dwarf with his legs crossed, chin resting on his hands. “Or the towns of Men in the south. There’s lots of places.”

“Go to Rohan.” Fili whispers, picking through his memories. “Rohan’s nice. The people smile lots there. Don’t go further east than the Iron Hills. It’s dark and people smell funny and there’s something odd in the way they talk.” Nori bites his tongue. Dark and odd is where he would be safest but he won’t tell Fíli that.

“Keep safe, kid.” He ruffles Fíli’s blonde curls. “I’ll hear about King Fíli someday, I know it.” Fíli lowers his dark blue eyes.

“When I’m King you can come back.” He promises, feeling Kíli lean against his arm. “I won’t arrest you.”

Nori only smiles sadly, slipping a little silver ring on Ori’s thumb before bidding them all goodbye.

-

“Arms up. Keep your shoulders square.” Dwalin barks his orders out, the training sword slung over his shoulder. Fíli obeys, watching the dwarf pace back and forth before him. There’s a new scar on his temple, two inches long. “Feet apart. Root them into the stone.”

“Yes Dwalin.” Fíli imagines being sunk into the earth, dirt up over his ankles. There’s something different inside of him today, he can feel it. Thorin’s hands on his mother, learning the truth about Kíli, Nori leaving, it all swirls around inside of him, a whirlpool and Fíli is afraid he will be sucked under. The weapon in his hand is a life-rope, tossed into the water. He clings to it. He needs to do this. He needs to protect _Amad_ and Kíli. He needs to fight.

Fíli tells himself that he’s not afraid. He hefts the sword in a defensive stance, waiting for the first strike.

-

“Fíli – we need to talk.” Thorin crouches down before his nephew, cornering him on the way to his lessons with Balin. Fíli won’t look at him, he flinches away when Thorin reaches out and touches his arm. “I gave you some time to settle down and for things to get back to normal. It’s been three months now, my boy. Look at me. Look into my eyes. Fíli _look at me.”_ Reluctantly, Fíli shifts his gaze. His stare is low and dark. Thorin can feel his heart withering inside of him.

Hatred swells. Fíli remembers him as clear as ever, pinning his mother to the wall, holding her down while she screamed and screamed at him. Curses and insults clamour in his throat and in a trembling voice the very worst one of all spits out.

“Fuck off.”

Thorin slaps him. He seizes a handful of hair and marches Fíli away. Not home, but to his own one-room hovel. He shoves him into a chair and screams at him until his voice is hoarse. Fíli sits with his arms crossed in a sullen frown. When Thorin has finished his hands are trembling. He sends Fíli home, knowing his scolding has done no good and he sits before the dead fire, twisting his grandfather’s ring around and around his finger until a red mark bites into the skin.

-

He’s the first dwarf that Nori sees since Ered Luin. In a town fifty miles east of South Undeep on the borders of Rohan. Sitting hunched over in the corner of a run-down old pub with a tattered travelling cloak pulled up over his head, he watches Nori with startling, _familiar_ dark blue eyes.

It’s not until Nori sits down that he sees the runes cut into the dwarf’s hollow cheeks. Old scars, cut with a heated knife. He is a marked Unperson, struck from the tongues of the living and the writings of the dead. Nori masks his surprise with a mouthful of cheap ale and plunges on ahead.

He says little, this marked dwarf. His voice is creaky and disused and he won’t look Nori in the eye. He won’t give his name, his father’s name, his tribe, or his home mountain. But he warms enough to lift the hood back from his face, ratty tangles of golden hair falling to his shoulders.

Nori sketches out his story. There isn’t much to say yet. He mentions Ered Luin and the dwarf’s eyes lower. His shoulders hunch even further, and he looks in terrible pain. He opens his mouth to speak when Nori finishes, lip quivering.

“Tell me. Is Thorin Oakenshield still King?”

“Thorin? Oh yes. He’s still young. I’m not sure he’s even a hundred.”

“Has he married yet?” If Nori was more worldly, he would have been a little suspicious about this dwarf’s interest in his King. As it is, he merely assumes the exile is eager for news of his own people. It must be so desperately lonely for him, cut off from not just tribe but every dwarf in Middle-Earth, forever. Pity plucks at his heartstrings.

“I don’t think he will.” Nori drains the last of his ale. “He’s declared Fíli his official heir so-”

“ _Fíli?”_ The dwarf tries to mask his expression, a shaking hand pressed over his mouth. “Fíli – his nephew? A little blonde dwarrow?” Tears slide down his face, running along the scars in his sagging cheeks.

Nori stares at the dark blue eyes, the golden tangles. He remembers Fíli throwing stones at the birds’ nest. He remembers Fíli’s aversion to male dwarves. He remembers how Fíli would hold his hands over his ears whenever anybody got angry around him. He remembers bare snatches of whispered conversation between Dís and his mother, how quiet they would fall whenever he wandered in.

And he knows.

 _“You_ _fucking bastard!”_ He knocks him down, and knocks him good. Blood streaks the dwarf’s dirty blonde hair and by the time Nori’s pulled off he’s lost three teeth and his nose is broken. They think Nori’s drunk; they lock him in the cells overnight to sober up. He shakes the bars but they are made of iron and will not bend or break.

When he’s let out, Nori scours the grubby little village for any sign of Fíli’s father. But he’s gone, and Nori never sees the dwarf again.


	4. Haunted

Kíli grows like a weed. He shoots up as frost hardens and softens and hardens again but he's still not as tall as he should be. Thorin doesn’t ask for him the way he did with Fíli. He is free for now. Nine years old and the world is nothing but a game to him. He disappears the morning and Dís has no idea where he has gone. He returns at night, muddy or blackened with coal-dust or dripping wet.

She scolds him lightly, wipes at his face with a damp rag. Kíli gives his brother a cheeky grin, but Fíli is pale and drawn and can’t smile back.

-

It’s hard. He feels everything roaring in his head. He sits alone sometimes, hiding, with his hands over his ears as though he can block it all out.

Training and lessons. Forms and stances, letter-shapes, names, dates, they all whirl around in a deep, murky mess. It’s like a swamp, he’s fallen in and he’s sinking to the bottom. The mud is thick and dark and he’s choking beneath it all.

He wonders if it’s his bad blood that’s doing it. They push him, Dwalin and Balin and Hónur and the rest. He knows he’s not good enough. He’s not what they want, a golden-haired mess of a prince. But he’s what they have and they’re just trying to make the best of it.

Fíli wants to be a King. He really, really does. This is what he tells himself in his quiet solitude. He tries to ignore that crushing panic in his chest. He tries not to think about how being a King has killed his grandfather and great-grandfather. How it has left Thorin isolated and cold, living along in that awful, grubby little one-room hole in the ground.

He tries not to be worried. Because he has Kíli. He has a brother that he loves more than anything and no one can _ever_ take Kíli away from him. He’ll die before he lets that happen.

-

Thorin watches from afar and he couldn’t be prouder.

King and prince rebuild their tattered relationship in small degrees. There’s no hiding from his uncle, and Fíli drops the scowls and downcast eyes. But he won’t smile in Thorin’s direction. Not yet. Kíli is bewildered at what has happened. He visits Thorin on his own when his mother is busy. He pokes around the forge and drops things and knocks over pails of water until Thorin sits him down with scrap metal or some little toy.

Kíli is brighter and happier than any dwarrow Thorin can remember. Everything is a joke to him. Even when he’s scolded, Kíli just beams and brushes it all off. He’s indestructible and nothing can touch him. He and Fíli are different in every way. Sun and moon, steady and crooked, fixed and free. Fíli regards everything with that same focussed quietness while Kíli bursts with loud, curious questions. Fíli is smart and quick and deft. Kíli, in his constant rushing about, is clumsy and unsteady. He exhausts Thorin in his short visits, but he leaves his uncle feeling giddy with joy.

Thorin wonders if this is what Frerin could have been, if they had let him.

-                 

There’s a new baby. Gimli is a hard little pebble and everybody loves him. Glóin is wealthy enough to throw a feast in honour of the child, and most of Ered Luin is invited. Even Dori is ingratiated enough to come, Ori clutching his hand nervously.

Kíli tears through the rarely-used feast-hall, and not even Thorin’s bellowing and Dwalin’s smack on his bottom slows him down. His eyes light up when Ori arrives and he drags the younger dwarrow away. Nobody knows where they’ve gone but at least they’re quiet. It’s Fíli who finds them hours later, in the coolstore where they found the spare cakes and gorged themselves until they couldn’t move.

The ale flows and talk chatters. Fíli plays his fiddle a little; he’s not very good yet and he made a few mistakes, but the hall burst into cheering all the same. Even Thorin is red-faced and smiling. He forgets and ruffles Fíli’s hair, circling his shoulders with a broad arm and shouting in his nephew’s ear that he didn’t tell Fíli just how proud he was, not enough.

Dís drinks but keeps her head. Across the table, Dwalin knocks back tankard after tankard, until he’s slurring and lopsided. He’s had too much, but Balin and Thorin are having too much fun and she decides to take him home herself.

“Oh Dís,” He leans on her shoulder. “You smell _wonderful._ What is that?”

“Sweat and vinegar, you big lump.” She staggers a little under his heavy weight. “And half an ale you emptied on my skirts.”

“’m sorry.” Dís shakes her head. “Migh-Might o’ had a bit much...”

“Might?” She likes the feeling of this body pressed against her, lolling and stupid as it is right now. She’s missed it, dearly.

They stumble home eventually. Dís drags him into his little alcove, laying him out on the bed and removing his clothes slowly. He watches, eyes half-lidded as she pulls off his boots and socks, working the buttons on his clothes.

“What _are_ you doing?”

“Relax, I’m just getting these things off so you can sleep.” She pulls the coat over his shoulders, and after a moment’s thought, starts unlacing his tunic. “I’m not trying to have my way with you.”

“Y’know – I wouldn’t mind.”

Dís’ hands freeze. “You’re drunk.” She doesn’t know how she keeps her voice so calm. “Don’t be stupid.”

Dwalin heaves himself up. His shirt hangs open, exposing the front of his chest, the scars and muscles and thick, dark hairs. His hands reach out, blind. One touches her face, the other gripping her shoulder like a guide-rope. His kiss is wet and sloppy and tastes like ale and roast mutton. She allows a brief moment of sweetness before drawing back.

“Dwalin.” Their foreheads touch. “You’ll regret this, the moment you wake up in the morning.” She _aches_ for him, even as clumsy and disconnected as this. She doesn’t mind if he can’t move, she’ll do all the work herself. Oh Mahal, she aches.

“I want you Dís.” His voice wobbles. “I want to marry you and have my own little Gimli’s and Fíli’s and Kíli’s. I-I want – I want what Glóin has, with you.”

Now she knows why he got so drunk.

Dwalin mumbles other things in the crook of her neck, clinging to her, trembling with want and need. The both of them feel the static with every brief shift of skin, fingertips on hands and necks and arms. She can feel him swelling and throbbing against her thigh and she’s leaking herself, cheeks growing hot and heart pounding and all the both of them can think about is how close it is, and yet so very, very far away. Anger and lust and tears all well up inside of her and she doesn’t know what will come out. She won’t get this opportunity to have him, not again. He won’t lose self-control a second time.

She leaves him, aching and alone. She doesn’t do it for Thorin’s sake. She couldn’t care less about what her brother thinks of her. She does it for Dwalin’s sanity, his sense of honour. He couldn’t live with himself after breaking an oath of loyalty.

Dís doesn’t return to the feast. She’s had enough. She retreats her cold, empty home, to take advantage of the blissful solitude and silence.

-

Fíli is nearly fifteen when the chokeberries are ready for picking. The berries themselves are rare and it’s been years since a harvest worth gathering.

Dís waits for the first good day, waking the boys early. The bushes are in the forest, ten miles east beyond the stony valley. Thorin won’t go. Chokeberries are a luxury, for jams and wines and nice things he won’t eat and there’s too much to do in the caves. But Dwalin will help her take the boys. It’s not Fíli she’s worried about. It’s her dark-haired terror of a son. She knows he will wander off, and it’s so easy to get lost, to fall and break an arm or leg or neck in that damp, slippery forest.

The boys run ahead in the valley as the dawn breaks. Kíli screeches, an empty basket strapped across his back. Fíli chases him, shouts at his brother to slow before he trips. Dwalin keeps looking back, anxious. She wonders why. It’s not until the pair are definitely out of sight that he wraps his hands around hers, squeezing tight.

“I’m sorry.” He whispers. Dís stares ahead, jaw tight. “Please Dís – don’t hate me.”

“I could never hate you.” She sounds tired. “I’d rather you were a friend than a stranger.” It’s still a distant second to her fist choice.

Kíli starts to drag and whine. Dwalin bears the skinny body on his shoulders with a grin. He jumped down when they stepped beneath the eaves. The forest is a rare treat for him. He vanishes ahead, disappearing like a shadow and Fíli runs after, screaming.

They stop for lunch, cold beef and cheese with crusty bread wrapped in wax paper. Dís and Dwalin lean against a tree, side-by-side with her head on his shoulder. They feel almost like lovers again, just for a moment. Kíli eats his sandwich too quickly; he tries to wrestle his brother for what’s left of his, Fíli holding his brother down with one arm and eating as fast as he can. But he saves the crust for Kíli, unable to bear the sad whining and pouting.

They don’t know it, but they are being watched.

They split up; the bushes are small and scattered and hard to find. Dís takes Fíli, and Dwalin Kíli. He’s overexcited and too much of a handful for his older brother to control. Dís and Fíli walk in silence for a while, unsure of what they can say to each other. It isn’t often they are alone without Kíli sleeping in the next room.

“How are your lessons going with the elders?” She tries after a time. Fíli only mutters a short _fine,_ eyes peeled for the little bristly leaves. “Are they treating you all right?” A silent nod. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

“I’m fine _Amad._ ” But his voice is short and strained and so _not_ fine that it cracks her heart. She can feel her lip trembling, as she tries to reach out for him and take his arm, but Fíli pulls away with a short grunt.

“Darling, don’t shut me out.” She stops, turning to him and grabbing his shoulders. He’s only a head shorter than her now, stout and broad. “Don’t lie, I can see straight through it.” Fíli only looks down, quiet. “Are they pushing you too hard?”

“No...” He mumbles the words, unable to express just how he’s feeling. He thinks that if he says it’s all too much, Dís will rush at her brother, at Dwalin. She will get angry and shout and they will draw back from him out of fear. He doesn’t want that. This is his fault, this failure, this sense of feeling overwhelmed. He doesn’t want anyone else blamed for it. She squeezes his shoulders, too tight, and he sighs after a long pause. “I’m not good enough for Thorin.” His admission is a soft whisper, and he squeezes his eyes shut, humiliation flushing his cheeks.

“What do you mean?”

“I keep messing up.” Fíli keeps his eyes closed. “And they have to explain it to me again sometimes. I try but I’m just... not enough.” Her fingers brush his cheeks, coaxing him to open his eyes. “I just want to make everyone happy, _Amad.”_

She winds her arms around him. “Oh _Fíli_. You’re plenty good enough. Thorin thinks the world of you.” She aches.

“I’m not a real prince of Durin.” His breath tickles her ear. Dís draws back.

“Fíli – _listen_ to me.” She holds his face in her hands. “You are Thorin’s nephew and heir. You are my son. Thror’s blood runs through your veins, and the other half is _not important._ ” He opens his eyes, unsure. “It means nothing to you or your brother, you hear me?”

Fíli nods, disbelieving.

-

They split up to cover more ground, out of sight but not screaming distance. Chokeberries grow in the furling leaves of bigger, stronger bushes, and Fíli has to kneel in the earth and pull at the hawthorn. He’s too absorbed in his work, and he doesn’t hear the footsteps crunch of twigs and leaves.

Then there’s a knife at his throat.

“Don’t move.” Fíli stops breathing. He feels the rough stubble against the joint of his neck and throat, below his ear. “Don’t make a sound.”

_He knows that voice from his nightmares._

Fíli’s eyes glance downwards. The hand on the knife trembles. It’s sinewy, knotted, mottled with dirt and mud. The ragged sleeve is slipping down his arm, and Fíli can see his mother’s name, burned into the skin of the dwarf’s wrist.

His heart is beating outside of his body. The bones have fallen out of his limbs and he _explodes_ with a blinding, screaming, white-hot flash of panic in every nerve.

“Stand up. Come on now.” The knife digs into his throat. Fíli slowly, very slowly, gets to his feet. His father holds onto one arm, standing over him. He reeks of sweat and rot. Fíli is turned to face the other, eyes meeting for the first time in over ten years. He is changed. He is sagging and almost colourless. His skin is grey, the scars white on his cheeks. Even his hair seems paler. Everything has leaked out of him. But his eyes are dark blue, hard and narrow like Fíli remembers. They haven’t changed.

“ _Adad.”_ It’s all he can say. The air comes out in the tiniest gasps, as though he’s not breathing at all.

“My son.” That prince stripped of name and home touches Fíli on the cheek. His beard is starting to stretch along his sharp jaw. “My _son.”_ Fíli’s lip trembles. He cannot move. His father licks his dry, cracked lips. “I thought you were dead.” The knife vanishes but his limbs are still frozen. “I thought I had lost you.”

 _You did._ But Fíli whispers it only in his mind. His father combs the blonde curls with his grubby fingers, nose wrinkling in distaste as he touches the braids. Those wet lips are pressed against Fíli’s forehead and he forces back a shudder.

“I’ve come to take you away.” The worn voice thrums through Fíli, a low vibration. “You’re coming home, Fíli.” Fíli’s voice is choking in his throat. He can’t utter a word. “Back to your rightful place.”

 _No._ Fíli starts to quake as his father takes his arms. Cries and screams pile up in his mouth but nothing can come out. He’s mute with fear.

“Come now.” He starts to pull at his son’s arms. “Fíli – come.” But Fíli is rigid and he will not move. “Fíli.”

And that joy, that sagging relief, tightens in his father’s face. He narrows and hardens and as quick as the snap of a bowstring. He always flicked so quickly between pain and love and joy and fear. Isolation and insanity have sharpened his temperament to a knife-edge.

“Let me go.” Fíli’s voice is hoarse and broken. He watches the lines of his father’s face deepen impossibly. He cannot move or breathe or think on anything else, at his moment. All he sees is those dark blue eyes, a mirror’s reflection of his own, fixed on his face and staring into his soul.

“ _Fíli_.” The grip is cutting off the dwarrow’s circulation. Fíli tries to take a step back, shaking his head. “ _Come.”_

“Let me go.” Fíli repeats, a balloon of panic pushing at his throat. He should scream now, scream for his mother to come and help him, for Dwalin. But he can see the knife on the edge of his periphery, resting at his father’s hip. “ _Adad-”_

“You think I will let you stay?” He strikes out like a snake, hissing in Fíli’s face. “With that _bitch_ and her lover? With that bastard you call a brother, in a filthy hovel for peasants? You are an _Ironfist_ , my son! You are a child of Kings!”

“Don’t say that about Kíli.” A white-hot needle pierces through his veil of fear, dragging a thread of anger behind it. “Don’t you _dare._ ” There’s broken birds eggs in his minds’ eye.

The exiled prince hits him across the cheek. Blonde curls and braids fly in the green air. Fíli’s grabbed by the front of his clothes. Their noses are close, close enough for Fíli to feel the breath on his quivering lips.

“How _dare_ your mother name that _whelp_ after _me_.” The fury leaves Fíli cold. “I’ll tear the bastard limb from limb and rub her nose in the blood like a dog.”

“No.” He feels weak and small and defenceless. His father is bigger than him, stronger, and he’s quailing in fear. “Let me go-”

“You’re not _like_ them, Fíli.” There is a leer on his face, stretching upwards into a smile. “You’re an Ironfist, inside and out. Your heart beats like mine. I know it. I see it in your eyes. They can’t tame you with their despotic goldlust. They’re sick Fíli. Every single one of them. They’re mad.”

“ _You’re_ mad.” He tries to struggle but his father is too strong. He’s bitten and weary from the road but he can still outwrestle a dwarrow. “ _Adad_ please-”

“Oh, I’m _perfectly_ sane.” But that gleam in eye looks so, so very wrong. Fíli can’t even lift his head in that direction. It’s lies it all has to be. “Do you think Thorin loves you, Fíli? Do you think he will care for you? He sold his _sister_ to me!”

“Stop.” He breaks into a choked sob. Fíli pushes his hands against his father’s chest, feeling ribs underneath the threadbare clothing. “Stop this.”

“Five hundred pounds of gold. A pittance _.”_ He draws back for a moment, to spit in the dirt. “He’d sell you in a heartbeat if anyone would pay the price. He would trade you like a prize beast. But Fíli, I would never forsake you. Your people, they will love you. They won’t give you up for anything.”

“Let me go!” Fíli’s voice cracks, higher.

“Don’t make this difficult, son.” He grabs a handful of soft golden curls. “I am _saving_ you from this, understand?” His hand trembles on Fíli’s cheek. His swings are frightening, from dizzying highs to plummeting lows. Fíli cannot stop trembling. “Come away. Let me protect you.”

“ _No!”_ Fíli howls in agony and distress. The screams bubble up as the pressure builds in his chest and break out. “ _Let me go!”_ He tries to hit his father, but the dwarf is too fast. He grips both wrists, pinning Fíli’s arms to his side. “ _AMAD! HELP ME!”_

“Shut _up!”_ It’s the roar of a beast in his ear. Fíli screams, red-faced and shaking. His voice is muffled by a knotted, grubby hand, the sour smell breaking against his nose. “Fíli if you don’t keep quiet I will slit the bastard’s throat _before your eyes.”_ Fíli slumps in the hold. “ _Do you understand me?”_

Fíli nods with a low moan. This feels like one of his nightmares. But this isn’t low embers and writhing, naked limbs. This is bright, it smells and he can feel every tiny particle with his trembling fingertips and he knows this is all very, _very_ real. No one can help him, there’s no one here, not Thorin or Dwalin or his mother. Just him and his father, broken and grey and rotting. Tears spill over and he can’t suppress the sobs that break from his chest.

“Hush – no son, don’t cry.” The voice lowers in his ear. “Quiet, just be quiet. Stop crying.” But Fíli convulses from the effort, the taste of dried mud spreading on his lips. “Fíli.” His father looks in agony. His teeth are gritted and mouth pulled downwards. “No – don’t cry.” He’s still restraining Fíli, keeping him quiet, acting as though his words could bring calm. “Don’t cry.”

“ _Get your hands off my son!”_

Dís didn’t know what she expected, hearing her eldest scream through the trees. Stupid, _stupid_ she should have taken her axe with her into the forest, or at the very least, a knife. She seized a heavy stick from the ground, club-like in size and weight. Her knuckles whiten around it now. There’s a deep snarl on her husband’s face. He whirls around to look at her, Fíli’s back crushed against his chest. His blue eyes are wet and afraid.

“You.” Hatred gleams. How long as he been waiting her in this forest, lurking in the trees like beast on the hunt, waiting for his prey to wander from the safety of the caves? Dís holds her breath. He looks down at her bare forearms, notices her scarred wrist. He contorts in pain, mouth shapeless and raw for a broken heartbeat. “You fucking _bitch!”_

“Let him go.” She tries to stop her hands from shaking. Fíli can’t move, he’s crying too hard to breathe, on the verge of collapse. Dís takes a step towards him, head held high. This ghost from the past has set her alight. She is on fire. Every piece of her crackles. She can’t address the shock, the pain and humiliation of seeing him in the flesh again. She doesn’t even notice how withered and colourless he has become. All she can see is her son trapped in his arms, writhing in terror. “Let my son _go!”_

He lunges at his wife. She sees the flash of the knife in the green forest-light as he rips it from his waist. Fíli is tossed aside, pushed into the dirt where he lands heavily, winded. Dís stands her ground. She knocks the knife out of his hand with her club, where it disappears into the leaves. He snarls, throwing his weight full against his chest, and she can’t withstand that blow. They both go down. He tries to wrap his hands around her neck and choke the life out of her. She knocks him over the head before losing her grip on the heavy branch. Blood drips, bright and red and gleaming.

Fíli can’t move. He crouched in the dirt, lungs heaving and cheeks wet. This isn’t like that night when he burst in to see Thorin pinning his mother. This is more raw and violent than anything he has _ever_ seen. She scratches at his face and neck, driving her knee into his groin. He shudders in pain and roars, blood coating the side of his face as he tries to strangle her. Fíli is like a child once more. A helpless child who cannot lift a finger in defence of his mother. He curls into a ball with his hands over his mouth. He can’t look away. His limbs are frozen, stiff and cold as ice.

“You cheap whore.” He’s panting, blood dripping on her face. “You _slut_ with your bastard boy.” She strains beneath him. “I’ll _kill you!”_ Dís arches her back and screams out. She gets him in the nose and he hisses and draws back. It’s like a heated knife placed against her temples. Dís uses elbows and knees and arms to roll over in the dirt and pin the dwarf down.

“You will _not!”_ She punches him in the jaw, muscles raised in fury beneath her white skin. “You’ll _never_ touch us again!” The threat to her and her children pulses through her shaking limbs. The rage is uncontrollable. She hits him, again and again, and although he’s fighting back it’s so very clear who is winning.

He’s groaning in pain, blood caked on his skin and streaking the pale hair red. She sees her chance. Her fingers run through the leaves, searching for the handle of leather-wrapped iron. Dís’ hand shakes as she finds the knife, bringing it to her husband’s neck with a breathless gasp.

It’s a moment frozen in time. The two of them hover, suspended in an orb of silence. He looks up at her, one eye open and the other already swelling shut. The knife rests against his throat. Dís stares down at him, at the sagging grey skin draped over jutting bones. The limp tangles of shoulder length hair. The scars marring his cheeks. The frail, wispy beard. He’s a broken and desolate creature. This isn’t the prince who took her away and loved her. This isn’t her husband. This is a husk, drifting empty on the wind. She feels the knife dig into his throat and gets no joy or relief from it. It’s meaningless.

This is worse than death, she realises with a deep thrum in her chest. The isolation and agony, wearing down to rags and bone – death would be a welcome relief. She looks in his lifeless open eye, into that soul she once knew so intimately. She sees what he wants.

The knife sinks into the earth beside him. She will not give it. “Never come here again.” She spits on his face. “Leave my son alone.”

And she leaves him, quivering and gasping in pain. She leaves him with the knife in the dirt and the blood on his face. Fíli is pressed against a tree trunk, still sobbing although his eyes have lost their moisture. She hauls him up roughly, unyielding.

“ _Amad-”_

“Run.”

-

She washes the blood from her hands in a little creek. There’s spots on her dress and she crushes chokeberry juice overtop of it to deceive Dwalin. She doesn't feel victorious. She doesn't feel like she has defeated him. She feels cold and numb, empty at the thought. Fíli is crouched on the bank, his hands splayed over his face. He won’t stop shaking.

“Fíli.” She kneels before him, taking his wrists in her wet hands. “Look at me darling. This is _important._ ” He opens his eyes. “You cannot tell _anyone_ about this. Not Thorin or Dwalin or _especially_ Kíli. Do you understand?”

“ _Amad?”_

“They cannot know.” Fíli’s lip trembles. His eyes are dry, but red and swollen. She kisses each of them in turn, clinging to him. It wasn't an act of mercy, what she did. Mercy would be to slit his throat and leave him to die, leave the body to rot to crumbling bones. What she did was further torture, keeping him alive in a world that refuses to admit that he ever for one second existed. What she did was revenge.

“H-he said he’d k-kill K-Kíli.” Fili’s teeth chatter. She aches, embracing him.

“He won’t. He won’t hurt either of you.” She promises. “He’ll never touch you again.”

-

He realises in the dead of night why his mother wanted it to be kept a secret. Kíli breathes in the bunk below him, soft and steady like a slow pulse. Fíli closes his eyes in the darkness and holds his own breath until the blood throbs in his head.

His father thought Kíli a bastard. He was so small and sharp and dark – it was easy to see how he would think Kíli was Dwalin’s little dwarrow, the way he climbed on Dwalin’s back and hung off his hand. They have similar eyes. The Ironfists will never want him. He is free. And so his mother will let the ghost vanish, for Kíli’s sake. She will let the secret die.

Fíli stares at the low ceiling through the darkness. His father’s words linger in his ears. They crawl about, like slimy worms digging through the rot. They won’t slither away. They ooze and throb. They cannot be true.

-

“Come, Fíli.” It’s after supper. Kíli has already been sent to bed and Fíli leans over his book, the words thick and hazy and running together. She stands at the ale-barrel in the coolest corner, filling a mug. “Sit by the fire.”

He perches on the edge of the woodbox, elbows on his knees. Dís presses the mug into his hands and leans back in her chair, reaching for her pipe. Fíli has never been allowed to drink before. He’s always been too young. He takes a frothy sip, wrinkling his nose at the taste.

“It’ll grow on you.” A cloud of blue smoke rises. Dís smiles at her eldest. “You’re not a dwarrow anymore Fíli.” Her lips pull down in sadness. “Well, not really.”

“Is this because of my father?” Fíli wraps his hands around the wooden mug. “Because of yesterday?”

Her eyes lower. “I’m sorry you had to suffer through that.” She reaches out and touches hi knee briefly. “Did you sleep all right?”

“Eventually.” He takes another bitter mouthful. “ _Amad..._ The things he said... I can’t stop thinking about them.” The worms are still there, writhing in the mud. He can’t keep them there, furling and twisting. “About me. About you and Thorin.”

“Lies, all of them.” Her voice is firm and hard. Fíli forces a shudder back as another gulp tunnels down his throat.

“So... Thorin didn’t sell you then?” The pipe lowers from her hands and Fíli know there’s a seed of truth in it.

“It wasn’t Thorin’s wish.” She hunches over, looking smaller and sadder than she has in years. “It was Thrór who had organised it. Your uncle was simply bound by contract, after Thrór had died.” Dís has a faraway look in her eyes. It is such a distant memory. “It broke him apart, Fíli. He was never the same and he still has regret in his heart. He’ll never forgive himself.”

Fíli stares into his ale, silent.

-

_-my son-_

_-do you think Thorin loves you-_

_-they’re sick-_

_-they can’t tame you-_

_-your heart beats like mine-_

_-you’re an Ironfist, inside and out-_

_-inside and out-_

_-inside and out-_

_-Ironfist-_

_-Ironfist-_

_-they can’t tame you-_

_-my son-_

- _Ironfist-_

Fíli winds his fingers around his curls and screams.

-

His hands shake, rifling through the sideboard drawer. He seizes junk in handfuls, tossing them on the floor. His hands close around bone and wood and paper and he wants them to close around steel.

“Fee?” His brother shuts the door behind him, books caked in mud and a streak of dirt on his cheek. Clumps of brown scatter the rug as he crosses the room. “Fee, what are you looking for?”

“Need-I need-need to c-cut it where are they _where are they!”_ Fíli wrenches the drawer free, upending it over the floor. He shuffles through the mess on his knees, tears running down his face as his father still screams in his ears, over and over.

“F-Fee?” His brother’s voice is small and frightened. Fíli hands close around the scissors with a broken sob. He grabs a fistful of blonde hair, Kíli gasping in terror. “ _No!”_ The little hands close around Fíli’s fingers, trying to prise the scissors free.

“Let _go_ Kíli!” He bellows, the stronger. But Kíli is firm and determined, his diamond-hard grip on his hands refusing to break. Fíli’s fingers grow slick with sweat. He tries to wrestle Kíli off, the both rolling around over the scraps and pieces of junk.

“Boys – _boys!”_ And then their mother is there, one hand on the scissors, the other pulling Kíli free. “What are you _doing?”_ They stop at her voice and straighten, red-faced and panting.

“He was going to c-cut his hair.” Kíli’s wild hair is plastered to the side of his face. Fíli’s face is set in a heavy snarl. Dís looks down at the scissors in her hands, horror rising in her gut. “ _Amad-”_

“Kili, go to your room and change into some clean things.” Her voice is low and tight. Kíli whines and complains but he gets up, leaving the two on the ground. Dís kneeling before him with her hands clenched in her lap, Fíli half-sitting up, thick limbs splayed on the carpet. He is glaring at his brother. “Darling.” She whispers. “ _Why?”_

“I don’t want it.” Fíli’s voice is edged with an anger she can’t remember hearing. Not on him. “Why – _why_ do I have to have it! All of you – you have dark hair and you’re so _lucky_! How can I lie about who I am? How can I keep it secret with this always reminding me that I’m _not like you!_ ” He breaks into heaving sobs. “How – how can I _forget_ when it won’t ever leave me alone?”

“Oh Fíli.” She embraces him, his cheeks wet on the front of her dress. “You have lovely hair. Kíli thinks it’s beautiful.”

“Because he doesn’t _know-”_

“Hush.” She crushes him. “Hush Fíli. Please don’t cry.”

But she can’t offer him words of comfort. She doesn’t have any to give. Her son is in pain, terrible pain and terror and confusion and there is nothing she can do to stop it. Helplessness and anger threaten in her mind and she wonders if it would have been better for Fíli, if he had watched his father die. 

-

He can feel himself growing insane, he is sure. His heart is like a hot coal burning in his chest, burning through the organs and bones and the skin, and soon it will fall out of him and he’ll be left cold and scarred and dying.

Fíli eats his breakfast silently, watching as Kíli chattered to his mother. She’s braiding his blonde curls into braids beneath his ears, smiling and listening. Fíli wishes he could be as innocent and sweet as his younger brother. But he is cursed and wild with the heart of a monster and no one will listen to him.

-

Fíli plucks up the courage after desperation has rent his soul and left him ragged. He visits Thorin when he knows he’ll be alone in his chilly one-room house. Thorin stands in the doorway with a little frown. He’s unsure and guarded.

Fíli embraces him silently. He’s tall enough to rest his forehead on Thorin’s sternum, arms bound tight around his uncle.

“I’m so sorry.” His voice is weak and muffled and Thorin feels his heart reinflate, beating hot and sick in his chest. Fíli holds on tight, tight enough to squeeze the air from Thorin’s lungs and he never ever wants to let go. He can’t stop hearing the screaming in his mind, the knife and the threats against Kíli, those blue eyes in their turbulent rage and the runes cut into loose grey skin. He remembers being crouched and frozen, unable to move or think or breathe while his mother lies screaming in the dirt. That is the meaning of anger and cruelty. That is fury.

But Thorin is Thorin, he’s grumpy and short-tempered and tiresome. His stories are long and dull and there’s always a tedious moral message at the end. He’s demanding and too strict and he smacks when he feels ignored. They couldn’t be more different really, and when Fíli lays aside that one moment of anger he sees someone who has only ever loved him.

“It’s all right, lad.” Nose-to-curls, Thorin breaths in deeply. The stout, firm little body pressed against him is shaking, and he doesn’t know why. He clings to it, as though he can absorb the tremors in his broad hands. “Calm down, it’s all right.”

Fíli doesn’t admit much. He finds the words stuck in his throat. He sits on the one chair in the house and Thorin perches before him on the edge of a wobbly table. But he says he’s afraid of his father, of turning out like him, and that is enough for Thorin to plunge into the heart of his fears.

“Listen to me, my nephew.” Thorin’s hands are on his face, hard and serious. “They have no claim on you. _Nothing._ They think you are dead and by the time they know the truth, it will be too late.” He smiles weakly. “You are a son of Durin. You are a Longbeard.” Thorin touches the mithril crest at Fíli’s neck. “You are a prince and one day, you will be King. And until that day comes, I will be at your side. I will _never_ leave you. I will never stop protecting you, and your brother, with every fibre of my being. I swear to you, Fíli. I would lay down my life for either of you in a heartbeat.”

Fíli believes him. Foolishly, blindly, he thinks what his uncle utters in that cold, dim little room will come to pass.


	5. A Hidden Face

Thorin moves back home. Dís purses her lips when she thinks no one is looking, but Kíli squeals in delight, grabbing the edge of his uncle’s tunic and begging for bedtime stories every night and rides on his shoulder. Thorin already feels worn out. Fíli is quiet, and at first Thorin is worried that he’s moving too fast again, the way he did when Fíli was so small and new and mistrusting and they sat cross-legged, facing each other before the worn hearth.

But he smiles at Thorin, pale and tired, reaching out and clasping his wrist for a long moment.

They wait until Kíli is tucked up in bed before sitting as a group together before the fire. Dís has her chair, and the edge of the wood-box has become Fíli’s. Thorin glances at the low stools against the far wall, beside their rough table, but instead he sits on the worn rug, looking up at his sister and nephew with the blood as thick and sweet as honey in his veins.

“Let’s put this all behind us.” He stretches out his hands, a peace offering. Dís purses her lips around her rough clay pipe, and Fíli clasps both hands around a half-full mug of ale. It’s becoming a nightly ritual, the fireside drink while his brother is in bed. It’s a welcome moment of peace. “Let’s forget all of this ever happened.”

“I would like that.” Fíli murmurs into his drink. He wants that and so much more. He wants to wake up in the morning with clean blood and a clean heart. He wants to be pure, the way Thorin is. He doesn’t want to feel like this, broken and half of something. He looks up and across at his mother, at her sapphire-blue eyes, her downturned mouth.

She nods silently, cold and aloof from Thorin. She doesn’t love him again, not yet. And Fíli doesn’t know why.

-

Kíli is sent to his own lessons. He’s like a wild bird, wrestled into a cage. He flaps madly but no one will let him out. He’s sloppy and fidgety and distracted, and everyone throws their hands up in despair.

“Why can’t I be with Fíli?” He asks one afternoon, with chalk all over his hands, his slate covered with indecipherable squiggles which are supposed to be runes. “Why can’t we be together?”

“Because, laddie.” Balin crouches down before him with a little smile, his eyes twinkling. “Fíli has to train very, very hard. His lessons are much tougher than yours. He’s a lot older and he has much more to learn, do you understand?”

“I-I s’pose?” Kíli screws up his face. “Why don’t I take classes with the others then? I don’t _like_ being alone. It’s _boring._ Can Ori come, when he’s old enough?”

“It’ll just be us, Kíli.” Mahal, he’s tugging at Balin’s ageing heart like this, with his tilted head and that little frown of confusion on his face. “Come now, wipe your slate clean and we’ll start over.”

It had to happen sometime, Balin muses with downcast eyes. Sooner or later they would have to clip Kíli’s wings.

-

“Why do we have to do this, Fee?” Kíli stares up at the bunk. “All the lessons. Are yours boring too?”

“They’re necessary, Kíli.” He rolls over and stares at the wall. “Go to sleep.”

“Why do we have to learn two alphabets? It seems silly. Why do I have to learn all these mouldy old kings anyway? Who even cares? They’re _so_ _boring_ , Nain and Dain and I can’t even remember the rest-”

“Why?” Fíli jumps down from his bunk, incensed at his brother’s idiocy. After ten long years of learning, he’s furious that Kíli can simply cast it all aside so thoughtlessly. He leans over the lower bed, catching Kíli’s dark eyes. “Dain I is your great-great grandfather Kíli, and his father Nain II is your great-great- _great_ -grandfather. Don’t be so _bloody_ ignorant.” The young dwarf has the blanket pulled up over his mouth, eyes very wide. “They are _your_ people, _your_ history – and you don’t even care – you’re such a _child!”_ Fíli punches the wooden frame of the bunk-bed with the last word, voice rising. His fist explodes in pain, but he grits his teeth, keeping his face steady. “We’re _princes_ , Kíli! I’ll be a King one day and you’ll be at my side and you can’t even write a single sentence of Khuzdul! Don’t you understand how _terrible_ that is?”

“I-I’m only twelve-”

“I was _eight!”_ Fíli crawls onto the bed, snarling. He doesn’t know why he’s doing this, he wants to stop so badly, but the words are tumbling out of them, it’s a raging torrent and he can’t fasten the gate. “When I was your age I could write in both languages, I knew _all_ the Kings back to Durin the Deathless, I could hammer out a sword-blade, I could knock down a dwarf twice my size - Mahal Kíli, why don’t you...” Fíli trails off and pulls back, horror rising in his stomach. Kíli is crying, biting down on the edge of his sheet and screwing up his eyes. “Oh –no Kíli, no.” He reaches out and brushes his brother’s shoulder. Kíli cries out, pulling the blanket over his head. “I’m sorry – I didn’t mean it, I _promise_. I-I just...”

“Go ‘way.” Kíli’s voice is muffled. His nose sounds blocked. Fíli withdraws, clambering blurry-eyed up to his bed and staring up at the ceiling. He won’t stop shaking. It’s stupid of him – how could he expect Kíli to ever understand how important this all was when nobody ever told him? Fíli burns with jealousy. He longs to have that innocence. But he’ll never get it. He can only protect Kíli’s fragile brightness with everything he has to give.

He apologises in the morning, hugging his brother close, squeezing Kíli until he whines and begs to be set free. He forgives Fíli, but the reproach in his soft brown eyes haunts him for the rest of the day.

He doesn’t broach the subject again.

-

Three years pass since she last saw her husband and Dís dares to think that all will be well. Fíli turns eighteen and there’s a small dinner, just the family. Balin and Dwalin are invited, as are Gloin and Oddleif. Kíli is allowed to hold Gimli – _very carefully_ –in his mother’s chair after dinner while Fíli and the adults gather around the table, drinking.

“Eighteen.” Thorin ruffles Fíli’s blonde curls. “Soon you’ll be twenty. Then thirty. And forty.” His expression clouds at the thought, for some reason. He disappears into his mug.

“Oh, he’s still a dwarrow Thorin, cheer up.” Dwalin settles back a little. “This is a celebration! Look at us.” His cheeks are a little flushed. “We’re happy, are we not?” He doesn’t look at Dís. “We’re not doing badly. No one’s hungry, no one’s cold. This isn’t Erebor, no, but it’s not Dunland either, thank Mahal.”

“No.” Thorin’s hoarse voice makes Dwalin lean forward. “Don’t think Mahal for that. Thank my sister.”

-

The letter comes in the spring, wrapped in a scarlet ribbon. Thorin is at the forge and it is Dís who cracks the seal and reads the contents.

She reads the first sentence and her heart stops beating. She sits up very still in her chair but it feels as though it’s still moving. She sees only fragments of the rest of the letter, fogged behind a veil of tears.

_Our son... Ironfist blood... rightful heir... compensate fully..._

She tears it into pieces, throws it on the fire. With a moan, Dís sinks forward onto the rug, on her hands and knees as a wave of nausea cripples her gut and she is so sure she will throw up.

She should have killed him and remained a ghost.

-

Was this the price of her vengeance? Dís wraps herself in her blankets and stares out at her little room. His dead, dark eyes are still there, framed in a face grey and gaunt and hollow. Dís buries her face in the pillow, but those eyes won’t stop staring at her. They never will.

She gets out of bed, walks slowly to the boys’ room. They’re both sleeping in the lower bunk tonight, Fíli on his side with his arm stretched out, Kíli pillowed against it. He’s gripping Fíli’s nightshirt in his sleep. Their chest rise and fall in slow unison.  She presses her cheek to the doorframe, watching her sons sleep for a long time.

-

Dís starts to watch out for ravens. Another comes with a scarlet-wrapped letter bound to his leg. She throws it on the fire, watching the ribbon curl and darken, withering to ash in the hearth. She hopes they will get the message, when they realise their letters are met with silence.

-

“ _Amad_ , can you teach me?” Dís braids Fíli’s hair, bent over him at the table while he eats. She twists golden curls into expert ropes, not even needing to look at her hands. She peers over the blonde mane and smiles at her youngest. “I want to do it.”

“Braid your brother’s hair?” There’s jam on Kíli’s face and he’s scattered crumbs across the table. “Wipe your hands and I’ll show you.” She and Fíli share a smile, waiting for Kíli to drag his stool across. “All right.” She combs her half-formed braid out with her fingers, showing him slowly. “Take the right, then bring it over the left. Then take the left, and bring it over the right, you see?”

Kíli nods. “Can I try?” His hands are so much smaller in Fíli’s hair. He buries fingers in the curls, feeling them shift against his skin for a curious moment before he starts to weave a thin braid below Fíli’s ear. “Am I doing it right?”

“You’re wonderful, darling.” It’s lopsided and the sections are uneven, but she doesn’t dare utter a word. Fíli chews on the crust of his bread, waiting patiently for his brother to finish the painstaking labour. He’s very good at sitting and waiting. “Now, fasten the clasp at the end.” Kíli does so with his tongue between his teeth, concentrating.

“It looks funny.” He draws back, wrinkling his nose. “I can’t do it.”

Dís presses her lips to his scalp in a soft kiss. “It takes practice, dear. Lots and lots of practice.”

-

Fíli’s stripped to the waist, two wooden swords in his hands. He’s gleaming with sweat and panting, his limbs shake and he feels that any moment, he could pitch forward and collapse onto the stone. Victory blossoms inside of him.

Dwalin sits up slowly, holding his stomach as he groans. His own training sword is five feet away, beyond his reach. He’s winded.

“Well done, lad.” He can’t stand up, just yet. Fíli doesn’t pretend to hide his satisfied grin. “Y’ bested me.” This is getting more and more common, now. Something else rests beneath Fíli’s skin, something dark and violent. It’s under control for now, but he’s frightened that Fíli’s temper will get the best of him, and one day he will crack.

-

“ _Amad_ , look.”

Kíli’s so proud as he shows her his slate. The runes are sloppy and lopsided and she can see some spelling mistakes, but she smiles all the same. “What do they say, my boy?” He’s still little, and she can easily stretch him out across her lap. He leans against her chest, babbling as his finger trails along the slate.

“Did I get it right?”

“Almost.” She sets it aside, hugging Kíli close, burying her nose in his messy thatch of hair. He endures the embrace silently, wondering why she is so very sad and quiet. “Oh, my baby.” And he is still her baby, really. He’s loud and thoughtless, he’s still far too small for his age, he’s hopeless in his lessons and he’s so painfully innocent it makes her heart swell. She wouldn’t have her son any other way, not for a moment. “Never change, Kíli.” She whispers. “Ever.”

-

It’s nighttime again, and Fíli is having his drink on the edge of the woodbox with Dís and her pipe. Thorin leaves them most nights, going in to give Kíli a bedtime story even though he’s far too old now. It’s their own private ritual, and he is loathe to intrude. Fíli looks up at him now, and smiles.

“How are things, my nephew?” He crouches in front of Fíli, blocking his view of Dís. “Are your lessons all right?”

“Good, Thorin.” He sets down the empty mug. “I’m beating Dwalin now, but I think he’s going easy on me. Balin says my classical Khuzdul is just about as good as Bifur’s, and I’m reading through all those books about law and politics.” Fíli wrinkles his nose a little. They’re dreadful and boring and reading just half a page is almost enough to put him to sleep. He doesn’t care for the stern laws that seem to go on for ever. But he forces another smile. He says what he knows Thorin wants to hear. “It’s fascinating, to read the laws of our people.” Behind Thorin, Dís shakes her head, unseen.

“Aye lad.” He wraps an arm around Fíli in a brief hug, beard brushing his forehead. “Good... Good that you’re reading about the old ways.”

-

Another letter comes, six months after Fíli turns twenty. Dís tears into the seal, hands trembling as she holds the paper up to her eyes. There are no pleasantries.

_Thorin Oakenshield_

_Since you have decided to ignore my previous attempts at communication, you leave me no choice but to use force. I am disappointed that this is the behaviour you have chosen to exhibit, considering the attempt at peace brokered between our people. I must find it necessary to mention, again, that this was your doing. In exiling my son, you struck him from my line and passed the succession to Fíli. I am merely exercising my legal right to claim my heir._

_A company of soldiers and ambassadors are making their way to your homeland in Belegost. I know you have no standing army, and no close allies to request aid. Do not make this difficult on yourself. Give me my grandson and keep the bastard boy, and we shall both have a King._

_I await your reply._

_Víli Stoneheart, Melhekh Kirikh-Mazur_

She finds Thorin, somehow. Dís doesn’t entirely remember bursting into the forge, but she is there, holding the letter out in her hand. She cannot speak.

Dwalin is there, and so is Gloin and Fíli. Dwalin supports her, guides her to a chair while Fíli stands with his sleeves rolled to the elbow, hair tied back and smuts on his face.

“ _Amad?”_ She is groaning, hands over her face as terror overwhelms her. She should have suspected this. She should have known this was coming. She’s furious at her weakness, her idiocy, for thinking she could merely throw those letters away without consequence. Fíli is gripping her hand, and she opens her eyes and sees her son, in his hard-nosed innocence. “ _Amad –_ what’s wrong?”

Thorin utters a low cry, one that makes all of them start. He’s a black shadow in the light of the red-hot coals, head bent with the paper crumpling in his first. He turns to look at his sister and nephew, and his lip is trembling.

“No.” He looks at Fíli now, his perfect Fíli, strong and sturdy and sure-footed and feels the world crumble around him to dust and ashes. “ _No._ ”

-

There’s a meeting of all the dwarves of note in the old-feast-hall. They sit around the long table with Thorin at his head, Dís at his right, Balin at his left. He still has the letter before him, heavily creased and crumpled and he smoothes it out on the wood.

“I’m sure all of you have already heard something by now.” Thorin’s voice is very low. “Fíli’s grandfather the – the Ironfist King – has –has put a claim on him.” At his right, Dís grits her teeth. Dwalin is at her other side, hands on her shoulders even though it’s improper and he should be beside his brother. “He has every right. Fíli’s father-tribe – they... they have the stronger right to him.” The last words are a whisper.

“Well – they’re not having ‘im!” Dwalin’s fist thuds on the table. “He’s _our_ prince. He’s a Longbeard and a son of Durin and he will be _our_ King!” There’s a mutter of agreement around the table. “We won’t let some eastern barbarians march in and take what is ours!”

“But what can we do? Hónur tried to be practical. “They’re bringing armed dwarves to our doorstep. Are we to barricade ourselves in and wait? Thorin – they’re serious about this. They’ll fight us if they must, and Víli knows he will win.”

“They are not taking my nephew.” Thorin is firm in this. “We have worked too long – _Fíli_ has worked too long – to lose everything. He is _ours_ and he will always be ours.” He can’t stop staring at the letter. One word keeps staring out at him, and he reads it over and over. _Bastard. Bastard. Bastard bastard bastard._

“He won’t give up, Thorin.” Balin stares down at his gloved hands, not knowing what it is he can do. “He has the legal right, he has the force to take Fíli-”

“ _He is not taking him!”_ The rest fall silent as Thorin rises to his feet, chest heaving. “Do you hear me? Víli will _never_ lay eyes on Fíli! Fíli will never see the Orocani Mountains! I will not let those _monsters_ take him away!” The voice has stuck in Dís’ throat. “No.” His hands are in fists, shaking at his sides. “Let them come. They will return home empty-handed.”

 “Thorin.” Dís reaches out and tries to grip her brother by the wrist. “Please don’t scream.” He turns to stare at her, his mouth slack. He’s going to collapse at any moment.

He draws in a ragged breath. “They’re not taking him.”

“No, they’re not.” Dwalin nods. Dís stands up, gently pushing Thorin on the shoulders, guiding him to sit. “Thorin, we will do everything. No one will touch our Fíli.”

“We’re nothing without him.” Balin makes the small, sad concession. “Without Fíli, Dain will step in and put that awful brat on the throne when Thorin’s gone. I know it.” Thorin stares down at the crumpled letter. No one will say outright that Kíli isn’t good enough to be King. But they’re all thinking it, with varying levels of pity and anger.

-

“What’s this about Kíli being a bastard?”Thorin at least waits until they are home. Dís slowly unwinds the scarf from her neck, stepping out of her fur-lined boots and into a pair soft house-slippers. He’s still fully-dressed; he waits with arms crossed for a response. Dís shrugs off her cloak slowly, hanging it up on the bent nail and Thorin grows impatient. “Answer me!”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” Dís’ hands are still on the cloak, knuckles growing white. She stares at the worn fabric, feeling dull and hollow.

“I want the truth!” He hisses, stepping forward. He doesn’t want to wake the boys. “Did you – with someone else?”

She whirls around, eyes blue fire. “And so what?” Her upper lip is stretched in a snarl. She looks like a violent, powerful beast of prey and Thorin is taken aback. “If I did take another in my bed, if Kíli is the child of somebody else, would you think less of me?” She reaches out, grips the front of his shirt. “It disgusts you, doesn’t it? Even after all this time – to think that I’m _impure_ , that I would break my marriage vows, bound as I am to a heartless _beast._ ” Dís feels the anger flow inside of her. It throbs hotly, like a drug, a heavy night of drinking. She feels intoxicated. She wants to hit him, her stone-hearted brother who will _never_ understand what it’s like to even feel. He’s cut himself off from that, and he thinks that he can force his sister to do the same. “You wish I was chaste. It destroys you, doesn’t it? Knowing that I’ve slept with another outside the marriage bed.”

Thorin’s eyes flicker down to her burned wrist. She sees it. A snort, almost a half-sob, spills from her lips. She releases her grip and turns away from him, hiding her face, gripping handfuls of her skirts. She could hurt him, hurt him terribly with the truth, and Mahal knows that she longs to. Maybe he would think twice before calling her a harlot, if he knew what had really happened. With a deep intake of breath, Dís lifts her head, staring outward, across their meagre room to the dead fireplace.

“There was no other.” She turns, her face in profile. She catches half the lanternlight. “Just him. Him and Dwalin. But now he is gone and Dwalin too and I’ll be just as clean and pious as you want me to be.” The weight of it all is crushing her. “They think Kíli has a different father, because I didn’t know I was pregnant when I left. We slept in separate rooms and didn’t touch each other. There was no love in the last years, Thorin.” He can see her face, half light and half shadow.

“Then how-”

“Don’t be dense.” Dís is sharp. “He hurt me, Thorin. Why do you think I left? Why do you think he was so guilty, when he saw you?” Her eye is a black pit in the illuminated half of her face. He can’t see if she’s looking at him. “He forced himself, like the _monster_ that he was.” Thorin gapes wordlessly. “You know what the Ironfists are like, brother.” She takes a step forward and he can see her better now. He can see both eyes, sharp and clear, without a hint of a tear. “Kíli is his son. I swear it. There was only him and the rage and pain he brought with it.”

She turns away from him then, leaves him to stand alone in the room with only the pale lanternlight for company. And in that light, staring at her back, he finally realises just how much she’s hurting from all of this.

-

He finds Dwalin in the morning, down at the edge of the cave-stream with his boots. He’s scrubbing with a bristle-brush, grunts and looks up as he sees his King take a seat on the stony bank.

“Thorin?” He sets it aside, watching the lowered blue-stone eyes stare at the stream. Thorin is twisting the ring at his finger again. Dwalin knows he’s thinking about his grandfather. He rests his hand gently on Thorin’s shoulder, waiting in silence for him to speak.

“Love her.” His voice is a thin whisper, when it finally comes out. Thorin looks from the water to his shield-brother, still twisting and twisting. “Dwalin – All I ever did was use her. I used her body, for gold, for heirs.” His head sinks into his hands. “She hates me Dwalin. I can see it in her eyes. She can’t stand me. I _hurt_ her, I let her be destroyed, and I kept hurting her, when I took you away.” He lifts his face, slowly. “Not again, I promise.” He reaches out, finds Dwalin’s hands, thick and broad-knuckled. He clings to him. “Love her.” He repeats.

“Aye.” Dwalin squeezes back, with the mud clinging in fragments to his skin and nails rimmed with back. He can’t say anything more.

-

Dwalin comes at night, when he knows everyone else will be asleep. Dís is kneading a thick grey dough made from flour and oats, rolling it into small buns, leaving them to rise overnight by the dying fire, ready to bake in the morning for breakfast.

Her hands are sticky and there’s flour on her cheek. He wipes it away wordlessly before kissing her, and with a moan she falls into him, streaking dough through his hair. They sink to the floor, hands and skin and trembling cloth, reforming like river-water parting around a rock, moving fluidly, effortlessly.

-

Kíli turns fifteen. He’s spoiled with presents and spends the day in chattering laughter. Fíli burns with jealousy. Five years ago, on that same day in his life, he was battling insanity, his father’s voice a roar in his ears. He was so sure that he was going to lose everything.

Kíli grins at him across the table, his mouth filled with honey-cake. He’s such a little scrap of a thing, who refuses to grow properly. He’s still six inches below Fíli’s shoulder, and when he holds him close in their nightclothes, he can feel the latticework of Kíli’s ribs against him, slowly moving in and out. He’s as distracted and flighty as ever, and Thorin is starting to mumble that maybe there’s something _wrong_ with him. Dís pulls her lips tight, eyes flashing, and Fíli can’t look at Thorin when he says those things, heart throbbing in his chest.

They sit together on Kíli’s bed after the little party is over, fingering his new gifts. A new cloak, a book, gloves, a good little hunting knife. They’re all things they think he will need, now that he is supposed to be growing up, Fíli says. Kíli leafs through the pages of the little manuscript, lower lip jutting out.

“But do I _have_ to start growing up?” He looked up at Fíli with his perfectly beardless face, his narrow jaw and the hair falling over his eyes. He’s such an oddity. Fíli wraps his arm around Kíli, tightly, feeling him breathe.

“Not if you don’t want to.” He whispers in the candlelight. “It’s all right, Kíli. I’ll look after you.”

-

“What made you change your mind?” She has to ask. Thorin has been avoiding her, making sure that at least one of the other boys is always around so she will have to keep quiet. She ambushes in his room two days after Kíli’s birthday and Thorin knows he is trapped. He sits on the edge of the bed with shoulders slumped, patting the mattress beside him. She takes a seat obediently. She could be petulant about this, throw it all back in his face and say that she doesn’t want Dwalin anymore. For all Thorin’s unspoken apologies, she is still under his thumb. But she thinks of that night, the skin and embers, and a shiver races down her spine. She knows she will never deny herself from that love and sweetness, when she has the chance.

“I realised how awful I’d been.” He stares directly into her eyes. “I treated you like – like _nothing.”_ Thorin reaches out to touch her, hands closing on her shoulder. “I’ve seen violence, Dís. I’ve suffered. But that hurt that he put you through – I can’t begin to imagine it.” He bends his head inwards. “I realised that I was seeing you as something I had to control. Something I _owned_ and – you’re not.” Her lip shakes. “You’re my _sister_ Dís. You’re all I have left, you and your boys. And I can’t lost you, _any_ of you.” He knocks the breath from her lungs in a hug. “Forgive me.” He’s crying in front of her. The pained humiliation rises in the air like a smell. “Dís please forgive me. I was just like _him_.”

“Of course I forgive you.” She rocks him gently, from side to side the way she does with her boys when they’re restless and upset. “You’re not like him. Not one bit.” Dís runs the curls through her fingers. “You’ve only ever loved me. I know that.” He just doesn’t know how to show it, without insulting the memory of their gold-crazed dead grandfather.

-

Thorin sends dozens of ravens, hoping one will reach the band of dwarves bound for his home. He waits, biting his nails until they bleed, thinking the ring will wear his finger down to the bone.

He can’t sleep anymore, he lies awake, paralysed. His grip on the crown hangs by a single, fraying thread and any moment he feels as though it will snap and fall through his fingers, lost forever.

-

Kíli combs through the hair with a metal comb, watching the curls spring back under his touch and gather six inches below Fíli’s shoulders. He does it with an odd little sigh, smoothing down the hair before he starts to braid.

“It’s so pretty.” He complains, on his knees with Fíli sitting at the edge of the bed, feet almost touching the floor. “How come you get to have nice hair, but I don’t?”

Fíli’s stomach goes tight for a horrible moment. His eyes dart to the side and he forces a shaky grin. “Because you look like _Amad_ , Kíli. And Thorin.”

“No I don’t.” There’s a scowl on his face. “I don’t look like _anybody._ ” He doesn’t stop braiding, weaving the blonde locks with painstaking effort. Fíli grabs his hands when he feels the fingers trembling on his scalp. He turns to face Kíli directly, his broad hands closing around Kíli’s bony little fists.

“You’re Kíli.” Their eyes lock into place. “You’re one of us. You’re whole, you understand?” There’s a firmness, an edge in Fíli’s voice that frightens him. He kneels stock-still beside his brother, afraid to pull away. “And we love you, all of us.”

-

Thorin receives a letter. The Ironfists are making their way west, via the Iron Hills and the Greenwood. They will be beyond the land of the Halflings in three months. Thorin has asked them to wait at the White Downs, and he will come to meet them. He doesn’t want those monsters anywhere near his people. Near Dís.

They agree, but only if Thorin brings Fíli. It’s a concession he knew he would have to make.

-

“Don’t be afraid.” He can feel Dís trembling in his arms. They lie, bound up in each other beneath the layers of fur and cloth. She rests her head on his shoulder, watching the rise and fall of his chest. He runs his fingers through the unravelling braids, wishing he could lie here forever, in his bed with the one he loves in his arms, a soft, warm night without end.

“I’m not.” But she’s lying, he can tell. _Everyone_ is afraid now. They live in fear of having their prince taken away from him, their last desperate chance to regain what was so painfully lost. Dwalin strokes her cheek, feeling her sigh.

They’re not young lovers anymore. There are no more downward glances and secret, stolen kisses. Dís knows to be prudent; she keeps her love for Dwalin inward, treating him just as she did before, with that well-worn, familial comfort. It’s only when they’re alone together at night and so sure that the rest are asleep, that the armour is torn off and cast aside. She’s reaching a happy medium, one where she has almost everything she’s ever wanted and yet no one is disturbed.

“Are you happy?” She asks the question after a moment of silence. She knows this isn’t what he wants, not really. He wants her name on his wrist. He wants to kiss her in front of a crowd, to fill her with children and sit every morning as she weaves braids into his hair. He doesn’t want a lover. He wants a wife. “With me, I mean. Like this.” She bites her lip and looks up at him. “Unmarried and unclean, keeping your love a secret.”

“I’m happier than I’ve ever been, when I’m with you.” And she feels his honesty. He takes her face in his hands, angling her up. “Of course I would marry you if I could. In a heartbeat, I would declare my love before our people. I would be the husband you never had, the one you deserved.” His fingers glide over her back, tight and knotted from years of lifting children and bending over fires. “But this is enough for me Dís. It’s more than enough. It’s more than I dared to dream of, ever since you left us.” So he’s placated then. Dis feels the shift, as he rolls her on her back, leaning over her and trailing thick, scarred fingers down her stomach.

They’re disconnected, even in this close union. Dís closes her eyes and feels herself spread out, loose and oozing, a spilled cup of wine. Nobody owns her, when she is like this. Thorin is releasing his hold on her and Dwalin can never truly be hers. She is glad beyond words. She doesn’t want a husband. She wants this, just this, a warm bed, a set of lips and hands, a deep voice saying that he loves her, and a grey dawn where she will slip back home and be a mother to fatherless children. She wants a wrist without a name stamped on it.

She wants to remain unclaimed.

-

“I’m going with you.”

“No, Dís.” He holds her hands. “I won’t let them ever look on you again.” They’re alone before the fireplace. The boys are sleeping.

Dís shakes her head. “He is _mine.”_

“He is _ours,_ ” he corrects her “and we will all protect him.” She bites her lip. “Stay with Kíli and keep him quiet. He doesn’t need to know about any of this.”

Her head inclines in a defeated nod.

-

“Why does Fíli get to go and not me?” Kíli whines and complains, hanging off his mother’s arm as Fíli shoulders his heavy pack. “I’m _almost_ as big as him,” that’s a lie “it’s not fair!”

Dís swallows her fear. “You don’t want to go, darling. It’s going to be a boring meeting with some ambassadors. Fíli has to go because Thorin wants him to learn how it’s done.”

“It’ll be real boring.” Fíli gives his brother a punch on the shoulder and Dís and Thorin share a glance. They haven’t told him yet. Thorin is sparing him from the stress and terror, for as long as he can. “And hey, if Balin and Dwalin and Hónur and Gloin are going, you won’t have lessons, will you?” Kíli’s grin stretched from ear to ear in jubilation.

“Yipee!” Dís releases her youngest and embraces Fíli tightly. That panic is rising, it pushes in her throat as she wraps her arms around his broad shoulders. He really is a perfect scale model of a true dwarf. She kisses him, the soft beginnings of his beard brushing her cheek.

“It’s only a week, _Amad.”_ He’s confused. He feels his mother shuddering against him, a suppressed sob and as she pulls away her mouth is a wavering line. Fíli’s heart starts to beat a little faster and he knows that there’s something not right about the way she won’t let him go.

“Come now,” It is Thorin who disentangles her. “He’s right, it’s only a week.” His eyes reflect her fear. “We’re coming back, every single one of us.”

She draws in a breath. “Don’t mention Kíli.” Her voice is a soft whisper, one she knows only Thorin will hear. “Let them think – let him be free.”

“Of course.” The understanding finally dawns on him. It’s worth the shame, to spare Kíli from that cruel Ironfist grasp.

-

“What’s going on.” There’s twelve of them, too many for the simple meeting Thorin mentioned. Fíli waits until the cave-mouth is behind them, leading the pony along the narrow path. “This isn’t just a meeting.” He stops. “Is it.”

“No.” Dwalin takes Fíli’s horse, and Balin Thorin’s. He grabs both of Fíli’s wrists, and the rest start to move on, leaving the pair to their privacy. “No Fíli, this isn’t just a meeting.” Dark blue eyes study him. “A while back, we received a letter.” He swallows. “From your grandfather.”

Fíli tears his hands away. “ _What?”_

“He’s claiming his right to you.” The words pour out of him before his nephew can get a word in edgeways. “He’s brought a company of soldiers to take you away and we’re going to meet them in the White Downs and – Fíli, _listen to me_ ,” Fíli starts to hyperventilate, struggling in Thorin’s hold. “Just breathe, calm down-”

“No.” Fíli’s still squirming, trying to twist himself free and run back to his mother’s arms. “Thorin – I’m not going I’m not _I’m not going!”_ The others pause now, looking back. “ _You can’t take me!”_

“ _Fíli!_ ” Thorin hold him tight, fighting through the awful fit of panic. Fíli writhes in the stone-hard grip, clawing at his uncle. “Fíli – no.” He managed to palm Fíli’s face, golden curls falling over his shaking hands. “You’re not going.” His voice catches. “They’re not taking you away.” Fíli’s chest heaves. “I’m not bringing them to our home, to Dís and Kíli, understand?” The dwarrow grabs handfuls of Thorin’s shirt. “I won’t let them take you.” He repeats. “You’re _everything_ to me, Fíli. They’re not taking you away.” He bends down and their foreheads touch. Fíli’s heaving gasps have slowed, and he’s weak in Thorin’s arms. “Trust me. Please.”

-

Fíli eats little when they stop for bed. He sits with the furs over his shoulder, staring into the fire. Thorin tries to placate him with a hand on his shoulders, a soft word in his ear, but Fíli turns away, cold and afraid.

He sees it in his mind eye. Waking up in his bunk. Kíli pulling at his arm to get up. Eating breakfast with his mother braiding his hair. Walking hand-in-hand with his brother along the main street and bidding him goodbye with a squeeze on the shoulder, a cheerful punch on the arm. And sweat, or fire, or bruises, or ink and paper. Fetching Kíli and taking the long way home, taking turns to walk along the stone wall with arms flung out, the other brother holding his hands out, ready to catch a falling body. Dinner with Thorin and _Amad,_ the soft talk ebbing and flowing as plates were cleared away and darning and books brought out.

There’s a hot swirling in his stomach, and Fíli clutches at it. He feels as though he might be sick at any moment. He’s terrified that this will be replaced with the unknown, with the violence and blood that he can still see sometimes, when he closes his eyes at night and feels his consciousness ebb away.

He wants to trust Thorin. But his father’s words won’t leave him alone, and he has a horrible feeling in his stomach that he’s going to be lost, that Kíli will be alone.

-

Dís is cleaning up the cluttered little room while Kíli is out. She straightens the rumpled blankets and picks up the dirty socks, dusting and tidying. She has to keep busy. Whenever her hands fall still, she feels herself start to break apart inside, those pieces of her crack and separate and she fights back tears.

As she’s pulling the blankets up on Fíli’s bed, she finds the comb. Fragments of gold are caught in the metal teeth. She winds them slowly around her finger, pulling tight and watching as the skin purples and throbs.

Dís buries her face in the pillow and breathes in deeply, breathing in the scent of her son, trapped in the feathers and cloth.

-

Fíli’s hair is washed and combed and braided meticulously. He’s wearing a blue tunic braided with gold, one he didn’t even know he had. Thorin’s wearing his best furs and he’s even found an old crown from somewhere.  He bends down a little before Fíli before they step inside, fingering his growing beard, the mithril necklace at his neck.

“Just remember, my nephew.” He whispers. “You will never see them again, after this night.” Fíli nods, not trust himself to speak.

There are a dozen Ironfists in the room. It’s a spacious hall, built for men and Thorin immediately feels small in it. There is a single table with two seats on either side of it. Sun streams through the windows, but Fíli feels cold. The dwarves start when they see Fíli, heads turn and hands lower from pensive chins. The walk along the hall is painfully long. They are judging him, weighing him up, testing their worth.

“Thorin Oakenshield.” The dwarf sitting down is streaked with grey, his face lined about the eyes. His beard is tucked into his belt, wild golden hair dreadlocked to his waist. Fíli’s heart pounds in his mouth. All twelve of them are varying shades of blonde, straw and sand cornsilk and gold. All twelve of them are dreadlocked, with rings of gold in eyebrows, in ears and noses and lips. Fíli couldn’t imagine ever looking like them. He feels the tug of the braids Thorin wove behind his ears and slowly lifts his head. The hard look in the dwarf’s eyes softens. “And Fíli.” There’s a reverent hush in his voice. “Look at you, you’re perfect.”

“Let us make this brief.” Thorin sits and Fíli beside him. The others cluster behind, forming a ring of protection around their King and prince. Dwalin scans the row of ten along the back wall and settles on who he think must be the leader, a toughened, grizzled thing, and he narrows his eyes. “Who are you and how did you find out about my nephew.”

“My name is Fíak.” The dwarf rests a hand on his own chest, not bothering with further pleasantries. He is one of Víli’s most trusted companions and knows his King’s heart well. “We received an anonymous letter stating your sister was still alive, that she had brought our Fíli from his home and mothered another child.” Fíli makes a noise in his throat, small and frightened, and Thorin grabs his hand. “Did you really think you could hide this from us, Thorin?”

“We had gone long enough without speaking before.” Thorin’s voice was a low growl. “Let me make this clear, Fíak. You are not taking Fíli with you when you leave here tonight.” The Ironfist dwarf pauses, eyes narrowing. “Fíli is remaining under my care.”

“Oh, is he now?” Fíak leans across slightly, studying Thorin’s face. “Need I remind you, Thorin Oakenshield, that we have every legal right as Fíli’s father-tribe to take him? The bonds of father and son are stronger than that of uncle and nephew.”

“You are not taking him tonight.” Thorin repeats, his thumb rubbing comforting circles across Fíli’s palm. “But I did not say you will not have him.” The Longbeard dwarves all froze at the words of their King, and Fíli lets out a short cry. “I understand your claim to him. I respect it, and I acknowledge that without Fíli, your line will end.” He can feel Fíli’s nails digging into his palm, blue eyes fixed on him, deep and accusing. “You will have your King.”

“Thorin _no!”_

 _“Peace_ , Dwalin.” Thorin draws in a long breath. This is his secret, because he knows it is all about the telling. He has to make them all believe that what he is about to say is true. “I will not risk open war for the sake of one child. Even Fíli.” He keeps his face ahead, stiff. “Fíli is yours. You may claim him as your King-in-waiting.”

“Uncle?” Fíli is shaking, and he knows he can’t show tears, or stamp his feet and shout. All of those things he wants to do, he keeps them shoved down and quiet, staring at Thorin with burning eyes. Fíaks’ smile is wide in his bearded face. “You said-”

“Hush, Fíli.” Thorin can’t look at him. He knows that the moment he does, the mask will crack and he will be exposed for the liar he is. He must keep his gaze fixed outward. “This is my word.” He is slow and steady. The hatred, the shock and anger radiates from the other dwarves. They are humiliated that Thorin has conceded so quickly, without a fight. The Ironfists sense their pain. They smile.

“But not now.” Fíak’s smile falters. “Why the wait?”

“I will raise him myself.” Thorin’s voice grows in confidence. “I will teach him the ways of _our_ people. I will teach him to be courageous and noble and honourable. I will not let him become a monster like his father.”

“Honourable.” Fíak sneers. “And when will you decide that he is fit to come to us, if we allow this to happen?”

“When he is of age.” Fíli can’t breathe. He bows his head so no one can see him. It’s less embarrassing than the tears that are falling from his eyes. “When he has fully matured, and is considered a true dwarf. Which in our people, is eighty years of age.”

“Eighty? What sort of-”

“Hush Otir.” Fíak throws up his hand at the exclamation from behind him. “He’s not lying. Longbeards come of age at eighty. They’re afraid of their birds flying the nest.” His expression darkens. “And if we reject these claims?”

“Fíli is not just the prince of my people.” Thorin’s voice is firm. “If you insult me and take him by force, you will have the Iron Hills to contend with. Dain will not allow you kidnap his cousin.”

“Dain? The one who named his son after _you?_ ” Fíak smirked. “Something tells me he’d be happier with Fíli out of the way.”

Thorin curls his hand into a tight fist. “Dain is an honourable dwarf.” His voice is a snarl.

“Honourable.” The blonde dwarf repeated again. He brushed back his hair, the thick dreadlocks falling over his shoulders. “Do you know what that word means, Thorin?”

Thorin ignores the jab at him. “You cannot take my nephew without permission.” He refuses to cave in to them. Fíli is rubbing at his eyes, unable to breathe in his terror. “The Broadbeams and Firebeards will not stand for it. They are our allies, much more than they are yours. You could incite a civil war.”

“You say that with fear, because you know you will lose.” But Thorin’s words have obviously struck some sort of chord inside of Fíak. He seems tenser with the revelation. “Víli sent me here on his behalf. You can imagine his disappointment, when I return without his grandson.”

“I will sign anything you want.” Thorin keeps his chin lifted. He’s still reaching out for Fíli, but the dwarrow has pushed his hand away. “Any contract, any treaty. You can bring your King a written promise, brokered in peace. Is that not better than returning with the scent of war in the air?” Dwalin is shaking with rage behind him, but he has the grace to keep quiet.

There’s a long silence. Thorin doesn’t look away. He forces his expression into something resembling defeat. “Very well.” Fíak dips his head. “I will draw up a contract.” Thorin stands without another word, turning away. “Let us sign it over a feast. Tonight.”

“Tonight.” He echoes, staring into Dwalin’s eyes. Cold disgust meets him. Fíli rises to his feet, shaking badly, jerking his hand away as Thorin reaches out to touch him. He grabs Dwalin instead, still crying but doing it silently, rubbing at his eyes with the sleeve of his unworn tunic.

“Want to explain that?” Dwalin hisses as soon as they are free. Thorin is still staring straight ahead with that same look on his face. Only now, his lip is trembling. “How – how can you _do_ this to the boy Thorin? How can you let them-”

“They are not taking him.” Thorin’s voice trembles. “What I did was buy time.” That mask cracks when he looks from Dwalin to Fíli, at his sweet little nephew curled into Dwalin’s side still wiping at his eyes and deadly afraid. “We have sixty years.” He looks at them all in turn.

“And then what?” Balin is disbelieving. “You cancel the contract? Thorin, they will _fight_ for him-”

“Then we will fight back.” He lifts his head, straightens his shoulders and for a brief moment he almost looks like a real King. “Let them come.” Fíli looks up at him, lip trembling. “We will be in Erebor.” There is a collective intake of breath. “I _swear_ it. We will be inside the Lonely Mountain and there will be nothing they can do to hurt us, not from there.”

“And if we’re not?” Hónur tentatively asks. Thorin turns to look at him, his lip curling.

“Then we don’t deserve him.”


	6. Oaths

“It’s done.” 

Thorin doesn’t look at her as he steps into the room. It’s late; he wanted a return with no ceremony. Fíli steps out of his boots and shrugs off his coat, heading straight to bed. He pushes Kíli aside and sleeps on the lower bunk, his head resting on his brother’s shoulder. In his sleep, Kili winds his arms around that familiar body with a smile.  

In the front room, Dís stares from her chair. Thorin unpacks everything slowly, hangs up his coat with a slow, methodical carefulness. He’s avoiding looking her in the eye, and she can see it.

“What did you promise them, Thorin.” He finally sits down, taking Fíli’s place at the edge of the wood-box. “What have you done to my son.”

Thorin still won’t look at her. “They won’t have him.” There’s dirt trapped in the creases of his skin. He flexes his hands, trying to get it out. “I was dishonourable. I was a liar. But I saved our son.” 

She sees right through his cryptic admission. “How long before they come for him? Ten, twenty, thirty years?”

“Sixty.” He finally lifts his eyes, half a degree. He can see her hands, twisting into knots. “I promised him when he’s of age to us. It’s all I could do.” Thorin’s gaze scales her arms, torso, shoulders. Her mouth is a straight line carved from stone. Her eyes are fire. “They won’t have him, Dís.” He gets up from the box and kneels before her taking her hand. “I will die before I let that happen. We will keep him safe, somehow.” She’s disgusted and defeated, all at once.

He doesn’t mention Erebor, not yet.  

-

They fray like old blankets, wear holes, and are darned and patched and mended. Balin starts to turn grey, Hónur passes away one cold winter, Fíli grows taller and fills out and Kíli remains stubbornly skinny. He still slacks off with his lessons but his concentration is slowly growing. He faces the world with that same bright smile and everything that tries to touch him simply burns away. 

Fíli throws himself into his training with a new vigour. Ever since he laid eyes on that band of Ironfists, a new fire has risen in his chest. He was angry at Thorin, frozen with fear and thinking that he was going to be taken away. He is growing to realise that he holds his own destiny in the palm of his hand. He lies in his bed and whispers the name Erebor to himself in the darkness, closing his eyes and imagining.

Thorin makes it clear that there is a long time yet. They won’t do anything before Fíli is sixty, at the very least. There’s no need to worry himself with the far-off future. He is told to put it in the back of his mind and remain focused on the here and now. All he needs to do is grow up. Stress mounts and he’s becoming increasingly unsure. He doesn’t want to go back to that nightmare of a mountain, with the ring of death and the smell of blood hanging in the air.  

-

Kíli doesn’t realise just how tense things are for his brother until he’s twenty-three. He comes home to see Fíli on his knees before the fire. In pieces is a vase painted with flowers and leaves. It’s a garish thing but inexplicably, Dís loved it. Fíli is fighting tears, trying to piece it together with shaking hands.  

“Fíli?” He kneels beside his brother. “What happened? Why are you crying?” Fíli looks up and his eyes are wild. “How did you break it?”

“I-I was practising with my sword.” Fíli gestures, lip shaking. “I know I’m not supposed to practice inside but I didn’t want anyone to see me and it’ s so cold out – Kíli please _Amad_ will kill me when she sees this.” He presses his hands over his face. “Stupid stupid I’m so stupid!”

Kíli reaches out, hand on Fíli’s shoulder. “No she won’t – it was just a mistake-”

“I don’t make mistakes!” Fíli tears his arm away, breath hitching. “Kíli, what do I do?” The vase really is beyond repair. Kíli picks up the broken pieces of pottery, turning them over. “She’ll kill me! I can’t have her know about this I can’t-”

“Boys?” There’s a voice as the door opens. Fíli freezes, mouth half-open in his horror. Dís gasps aloud at the sight, both dwarrows kneeling over the broken vase. “Mahal what happened?” Her voice rises. “Who did this?”

Kíli looks at his brother for a fleeting moment, at the horror on his face and his wide eyes. He licks his lips and turns his neck to look at her, forcing an apologetic smile on his face.

“I’m sorry _Amad_.” Fíli bites back a gasp. “I was playing with Fíli’s sword and I got excited.” Kíli stands up with the shards still in his hands. “It was just an accident.”

“Oh, Kíli,” She clicks her tongue, shaking her head. “You foolish boy!” Fíli kneels on the rug, frozen. “You know not to be boisterous inside and this is why.”  

“I’m sorry.” Kíli winks when Dís kneels to collect the broken pieces. “I wasn’t thinking, _Amad_.”

“No, you weren’t.” Fíli helps, his hands shaking so plainly that he is sure his mother can see them. She doesn’t seem to notice, too angry and exasperated with her youngest. “You never do.”

Kíli is scolded and sent to bed without any supper. Fíli smuggles in a little crusty bun and a hunk of cheese, sick with guilt.

“Don’t worry, Fíli.” He gets crumbs all through the bed, grinning. “I’m always in trouble anyway and you looked so upset... I don’t mind.”  

“I should come clean.” Fíli whispers. “I should tell them it was me.”

Kíli shakes his head. “Then I’ll be in trouble for lying. Just let this happen. I don’t mind being yelled at and I know you don’t like it.” He squeezes Fíli’s thick fingers, brushing his soft fingertips over worn skin, older than it should feel. “You look after me all the time. I like being able to look after you too, in my own way.”

-

Fíli tries so hard to be perfect, he really does. In his head he knows that if he’s not good enough, he’s bound for the east. Thorin murmurs that he’s planning to send Fíli to the Iron Hills for a few years, for training and to show Dain what a wonderful prince his nephew is. It’s not for a long time but Fíli is determined to prove himself. He only wants to be worthy.

But inside, he feels as though he’s weak. He’s a frightened child with a bad temper and this image of himself as a perfect prince is nothing more than a hollow mask. He’s afraid that Thorin will know, that they will accept what he really is and declare that he’s not worthy of the honour Thorin wishes to bestow on him. He can’t tell Thorin or Dwalin or Balin about this fear that’s eating him whole. He would never put the burden on Kíli. So he rots alone for a long time, trying his best to be the prince they want but at the same time sure that it’s all a lie that will collapse at any moment, the mask will fall off and everyone will see him for what he really is.  

-

Dís thinks she will be alone at Glori’s grave. She walks for two miles to gather flowers from the nearby forests, and they’re the last lingering blooms of the season, pale and droopy. They seem even sadder in the dim underground light.

But she’s not. She turns into the high-ceilinged cave and sees a little orb of golden light by Glori’s tomb. A tousled mop of auburn hair is bent downwards, a thin figure in grey and lilac sitting with his legs crossed on the tomb.  

“... Everyone’s nice and I’ll be sad to leave.” Ori’s talking. Dís holds her breath and listens, unseen. “But Dori says I can read and write and that’s enough. I want to be a scribe, like they have in the towns of Men. I even asked Balin about it but he said I wouldn’t get enough paid work to look after myself here. I don’t want to go. I like the books and the writing and remembering all the dates and names. But Dori says if I want to make something of myself I need to go out and work.” There’s a little sniff in the air. “He says I’m twenty-five and that when he was my age he was shovelling coal for brass farthings and no one else is going to look out of me. I wish you were here, Mama. You’d look after me, wouldn’t you?”  

Oh, Ori. Dís watches him, shaking her head. “I miss Nori, too.” Ori’s thin little voice falls like a stone in the dark. “I just wish one of you were here. I love Dori to bits but he’s always tired and grumpy and he makes me wash the dishes at night while he’s working.” He sighs. “I’m scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know what I did wrong, I try all the time to please Dori but nothing makes him smile and I don’t know what to do.” Having enough of this, Dís walked heavily across the stone, whistling a soft tune to herself and trying to make it seem as though she wasn’t eavesdropping.

Ori gasped. He turned to see her and wiped at his eyes, hiding his mouth with a thick grey scarf. He was such an odd-looking thing all right. While Kíli was small, merely looking a few years younger than he really was, Ori was bony and awkward. He was lanky and his arms seemed to stick out at odd angles. He was all unravelling braids and acres of wool and a big, beaky nose. Dís thought she saw a trace of Glori around the dwarrow’s eyes.

“D-Dís.” Ori tries to smooth his rumpled clothing. “Hello.” She sat down beside him on the tomb, laying the flowers out and pressing her warm palms to the stone.

“How are you doing, Ori?” The dwarrow looks away and mumbles, embarrassed. “I haven’t seen you in a while. You and Kíli used to be thick as thieves before Balin took him in for lessons.”

“I don’t think he likes me very much now.” Ori coughs. “I-I don’t like running about and making a ruckus like him. I like sitting in the upstairs room with books and paper.” She watches him. “He likes to hang around with boys that are bigger and stronger than I am.” He looks very glum. “Dori said that you used to know Mama well. You two were always at each other’s houses.”

“That’s right.” She smoothes down a stray lock of auburn hair. “Glori was one of my best friends.”  

Ori bears her touch silently, heart thudding. “But... people say that she... she was awful.”

“She wasn’t awful.” Dís corrects the dwarrow. “She was the most wonderful dam I’ve ever met. She’s stronger than any of those horrid dwarves, Ori. No one really knew her. They didn’t want to.” His wide eyes fix on her. “But she was better than all of them. She didn’t let them all hurt her.” Dís aches with jealously remembering. She has always longed for that freedom.  

Hazel eyes shift down to his knees. “Would she have liked me?” His hands twist in their gloves and with a low sigh Dís drapes an arm across Ori’s knobbly shoulders.  

“She would have loved you, Ori.” She promises. “She would tell you that you were wonderful, and she wouldn’t want you to change a thing.”

-

“ _Amad_ can you help me cut my beard?” The request surprises Dís. Fíli runs a hand over his coarse whiskers, starting to curl at his chin.

“Are you sure?” Burning with jealousy across the table, Kíli watches his mother sit down and take Fíli’s hands in hers. “You don’t want to grow it out?”

“No.” Fíli shakes his head. “It’s not right - if Thorin doesn’t have a beard, then I shouldn’t either. Not a long one.” He’s technically right. Dís smiles sadly and nods, pressing her lips to the blonde’s forehead.

“Of course my darling.” She sighs. Inwardly, she’s glad. It will stop Fíli from looking like _him,_ as he grows taller and his face hardens. Her son is older now than her husband was, when she married him. Her hands clasp half-around thick arms and jewel-blue eyes widen at the thought. Her babies are growing up, faster than she wants. She’s not young anymore, as she feels Fíli breathe against her. There are lines around her eyes and now her son is old enough to cut his beard. Time moves on. It wasn’t going to stop for any of them.

-

Kíli knows that his brother is due to leave. He’s always known that Fíli is due for a long sabbatical when he turns forty, But his brother turns thirty, thirty-five, thirty-six, thirty-seven, and all of a sudden that distant dream mutates into frightening reality. He doesn’t want Fíli to go. He can’t live without him. Fíli is a constant, even with his tears and screaming and anger. They’re only flashes, they burn for a single moment and then he fades away into his rock-steady self and Kli feels as though everything is all right with the world again. He can’t live without him.

He begs Thorin to go too. He promises to be good, to listen, to work hard and act on his best behaviour. He won’t slack off and break things and let his attention wander. He won’t play any more pranks. He _promises_.

Thorin only smiles sadly, shakes his head and grips Kíli’s shoulder for a tight, brief moment.  

-

Kíli is quiet at the birthday feast. He sits beside his brother, picking at his food. Dwalin jokes and jostles him, cracking puns and trying to force a smile from the dark-haired dwarrow, but it’s all useless. Kíli remains despondent.

“Oh, don’t look so sad.” They sit side-by-side on the lower bunk afterwards, Fíli throwing an arm over his brother’s skinny shoulders. He’s still a head shorter, thin and wiry with big eyes and a big mouth and a big heart and Fíli couldn’t imagine ever loving anyone as much as he does Kíli. “It’s only for a few years. I have to go, y’know.” He sighs. “You’ll be alright without me, little brother. You’ll have Thorin and _Amad_ and Dwalin, they’ll look after you.”

“I don’t want them.” He buries his face in Fíli’s shoulder. “I want _you_.”

-

No one can find Kíli on the day Fíli is supposed to go. He’s already slipped out in the night, and Fíli awakes to an empty bed.  

Fíli and Balin are supposed to leave straight after breakfast and Thorin is furious. They search Ered Luin while Fíli pushes at his porridge, but Kíli isn’t found. Eventually they sigh and shrug and tell Fíli to pull on his cloak and boots.

Dís hugs her boy for a long time. He’s almost as tall as her now, broad and heavy and it’s so hard to reconcile this growing dwarrow with that little baby she held in her arms, those big blue eyes and chubby red cheeks. She’s proud of him. She whispers that in his ear. She tells Fíli to knock some sense into that Dain and show him that there’s still fight in their line. She doesn’t know why she’s indulging this charade. Maybe there is a thread inside of her, thin as silk, that still cares for all of this after all.  

Thorin follows them to the mouth of the valley before parting. Fíli’s hair is like spun gold in the sunshine and he realises then just how much he is going to miss his nephew. He keeps the parting brief for his own sake and returns to the dim mountain, feeling empty. 

He searches Ered Luin once more, this time paying closer attention to the nooks and crannies in the stone. Thorin finds his nephew curled up in a dim little crevice above the lake, head in his hands. He starts when he sees his uncle, wipes at his eyes and lifts his head, pretending he’s not crying.

“Fíli’s upset you weren’t there to say goodbye.” He sits down beside his nephew, legs dangling over the rock. “Dís will be furious, when you get home.” But he hugs the small body close. “You’re a little fool, Kíli.”

“I c-couldn’t say goodbye to him.” Kíli sniffed. “I couldn’t watch him go.” Thorin rubs wide circles in his back, feeling the shape of bones beneath his palm. There’s a long silence, before Kíli takes in a breath.  

“I’m so sorry uncle.” He drags his sleeve across his face again. “I-I’m a disappointment, aren’t I?” Kíli looks up at him. “That’s why I’m not going.”

“Oh, Kíli no—”

 “D-don’t try to spare my feelings.” He snarls, hands trembling in his humiliation. “I’m not stupid – I know you think I am but I’m not.” Thorin draws back. “It’s because I’m no good a-at anything.” Kíli digs at his leaking eyes. “I try Thorin, I try all the time, and I’m never good – I c-can’t fight like Fíli and I’m not a good writer and I always break everything I try to make.” His head is bent. “I’m useless.”

“Oh – no Kíli.” Has he ever hugged his nephew as tightly as he is now? He feels as though those slim, frail bones will crack like glass in his tight grip. “You’re not useless, you hear me?” Thorin lifts Kíli’s chin with a finger. “You are wonderful. We all love you, more than anything. You’re our sun and stars.” Kíli closes his eyes at the wet kiss on his forehead. “You’re not useless, my nephew. You’re just young.” He smiles. “Don’t measure yourself up to Fíli, all right? No comparisons. You’re two different people.” Kíli nods but Thorin is wrong. They’re not. They’re the same, two halves of a whole.  

“Look.” After a very long silence, Thorin reaches down at his waist. Kíli holds his breath and watches as he unbuckles his thick belt. There’s a lump at his throat as he does this. It’s his most prized possession, this knife. It’s the last fading link to Thrór, to Erebor, to that glittering past. He’s slept with it at his side for nearly a hundred years. Thorin pulls it off now and presses it into his nephew’s hands. “I wouldn’t give you this if I didn’t think you deserved it.”  

“U-Uncle?” Kíli unsheaths two inches of gleaming steel, gasping. “This – this was your grandfathers.”

“And now it is yours.” His voice is firm. “Don’t ever think you are useless Kíli. Not for a single moment.” The breath is knocked from his lungs in the tight embrace and Thorin smiles.

“I won’t.” His promise swells in Thorin’s heart. “I’ll keep it forever Thorin. I’ll make you proud and earn the name of Durin and die with it at my side, I _swear_."

-

All the same, it is a problem and Thorin talks it over with Dwalin after a few weeks. He visits his friend at his own house, lonely now without Balin.  

“He just needs something.” Thorin stares into his half-empty mug. “Something to dedicate himself to, something he’s good at. I think that’s what he’s been missing out on. Kíli’s not a fighter or a smith or a scholar... but there must be something.”

Dwalin’s smoking a thick pipe. “It’s no secret that the lad’s unhappy.” A cloud of smoke rises. “Fíli leaving was a bad shock to him. He was alright before all that.” He sucks on the wood, thinking carefully. “It depends Thorin. There will be something he’s good at – but is it something you _want_ him to be good at, that’s the question.”  

Thorin chews for a time on the inside of his cheek. “He told you about the archery, then.” It was a single burning incident on his mind. His face flushes with the memory. “I won’t deny it’s not useful... But Dwalin, it’s not _us_ , is it? I can draw a bow if I must, but it’s not _all_ I do.”

“You came here for advice, I gave it.” He sounds quite cool, knocking a clump of blackened tobacco out on the table. “I worry about the boy Thorin, I do.” Dwalin admits in the quiet. “He’s not like Fíli at all. He’s another—”

“Another Frerin, I know.” Thorin sighs heavily, raking his fingers through raven-black curls. “Mahal, I don’t want that to happen again.” It’s his heaviest shame, heavier even than what he did to Dís. “It _can’t_.”

 -

He tosses and turns for several nights before heading out of their valley. Thorin asks around, sends letters, and is finally put in touch with a grizzled, middle-aged man named Aldin with a missing index finger and a thick scar down his cheek. His left eye is patched. He’s tall and lean, he sits with his legs stretched out under the table, leaning back in his chair.  

“Been a few years since I’ve drawn a bow.” He remarks, pointing at his missing eye with a middle finger. “Retired.”

“I’ll pay you handsomely.” Thorin promises, not knowing where he’ll exactly come up with the money. “They say you’re the best, you’ve seen real combat. I’ll put you up in our town, free of charge.” Aldin takes a long swig of ale, rolling it around in his mouth, deep in thought.  

“Your nephew, huh?” He raises his good eyebrow, the one not puckered with scar tissue. “Untrained. Is he disciplined and well-behaved?”

“He’s perfect.” Thorin lies. “You won’t have any trouble with him, I promise.” The haggard archer finally nods after a long silence.  

“You have my word, Thorin Oakenshield.” They shake hands. “I’ll make a master of the lad.”  

-

Dís tries not to be high and mighty about it. She told Thorin a long time ago that he was going about it all wrong with Kíli and it’s only now that he’s even listening. She can feel the fight leaving her. She’s wearing down and ageing.  

“Is it anger?” Dwalin is weaving a little braid into her hair, beneath the ear where no one else will see it. “Are you angry at him?”

Dís lies back and lets him touch her. Pillows and sheets and blankets wrap themselves around her and she all of a sudden feels hypersensitive. The fabric is like sandpaper against her skin.

She merely sighs. “I don’t know what I am, anymore.”

-

His head almost brushes the ceiling of his small home and when he sits on a stool, Aldin’s legs go almost up to his chest. Dís bites her lip and tries not to smile. She pours him tea and sits with him while Thorin goes to fetch Kíli. He’s short-spoken and quiet. He keeps looking at her beard with a little head-shake and eyes the rustic room with his keen eye.  

Aldin rises to his feet at the sound of the opening door. When Kíli is brought in, his single eye widens and he can’t contain his shock. He knows what dwarves are supposed to look like. He can tell with Kíli’s tunic rolled up to the elbow and belted at his waist that he’s too thin, his hands at small and bony and there’s not a whisper of hair on his face.  

“Kíli, this is Aldin.” Thorin touches the dwarrow’s shoulder. “He’s going to be your archery instructor.” It was supposed to be a happy surprise. Kíli’s eyes grow wide and a grin breaks across his face.  

“Really?” The man winces at his high, breaking almost into a screech. Thorin is choked in a hug. “Oh Thorin thank you thank you _thank you!_ ”

-

He’s not disciplined. Aldin feels cheated. They eat dinner together in a soft introduction. Kíli is told to sit up straight, stop chewing with his mouth open and playing with his food. He fiddles with his fork and drops it and laughs too loudly and asks awkward questions. Thorin tries to act as though Kíli is acting out, he’s normally not like this at all but Aldin catches the resigned look in the dwarf’s eye.  

He gets up before dawn and walks out of the valley and into the edges of the soft green forest. In the grey light, Aldin searches for the right spot, a broad tree-trunk with a clear space before it, backed with a short stone cliff. No stray arrows will fly through these trees.  

Kíli is a bundle of excitement. He’s not nervous about being alone with this stranger in the slightest. He tears off his cloak and bounces on the balls of his feet, asking if they can go hunting, if he can learn how to shoot while riding a pony. Aldin simply hands him a child’s bow and asks him to hit six arrows at the target he’s painted in white on the broad tree trunk.

His stance is sloppy, he can’t hold the bow quite straight and he has no technique, but there’s definitely _something_ there. The moment the bow is in his hand, Kíli is serious and concentrated, tongue between his teeth and brow furrowed. He’s thinking. He’s not a bad shot, certainly not for a child with no training. There’s potential, a lot of it. Aldin stares at the notched target with arms crossed, and then looks at Kíli’s locked legs and straight back.  

“What do you know about fighting?” He asks first. “Hand-to-hand combat, swordplay, and the like?” Kíli bites his lip and looks away.

“Not much.” He admits after a long leafy silence. He can’t root himself in the stone the way Dwalin commands. He’s too small and thin. He’s a little twig that can snap in half with a single push. Aldin smirks, clapping his hand on the thin shoulder at his elbow.  

“Good.” Kíli looks up. “We’re going to start right from the beginning. Forget everything those dwarves ever taught you Kíli, and you’ll soon be the best archer they’ve ever laid eyes on.”

-

There’s a welcoming party, and it’s bigger than anything Fíli can remember. Dain is draped in gold and gems, his beard stretches to his waist and he’s heavy with thick velvet. He kisses Fíli once on the forehead and stands for a long time with his hand on the dwarrow’s shoulder. He scours Fíli, getting into his head through his eyes, reading his expression and taking stock of his threadbare cloak, his sturdy shoulders and broad hands.

And he smiles. It feels forced. “Cousin Fíli.” His grip tightens for a moment. “You’re even better than I imagined. Come, I’ll show you to your rooms.”

There’s a huge bed with a canopy, a carved chest stuffed with robes and tunics and trousers in Fíli’s size, a shelf filled with books. Fíli sits on the edge of the bed, alone, staring down at his knees. He feels lonely. He looks at the hangings and the trinkets, ornately carved and gleaming in the light. His eyes lower to his coarse, ragged clothing, wearing through from the long but mostly uneventful journey. Fíli pulls out the crest at his neck, so tarnished and small, and holds on to it tightly. He already misses his brother. He misses home.

He isn’t afraid. Fíli lifts his head. He’s not a fool. He knows that Dain wants to take the crown once his uncle is gone. Nobody has told him outright, but he’s read enough old tomes on law and history and politics to know the meaning behind Dain naming his son Thorin. Fíli is here as evidence. This is an insurance policy.

-

Kíli learns quickly. Aldin sets up a complicated and exhausting training routine, making him run and swim and climb as well as shoot. He and Kíli practise hand-to-hand, with the grizzled man teaching him to spring back, remain light on his feet and shift his weight quickly. It’s more intensive than anything Kíli has ever done, stretching from dawn to dusk every day and leaving him aching and exhausted.

He’s never been happier. He’s _good,_ he knows he is, and when he sees that little smirk on Aldin’s face Kíli knows his teacher thinks so, too. For the first time in his life he looks at himself and he feels proud of what he can do. Everything seems to change, even in those first few weeks. He starts eating more, asking for seconds and heaping his plate. He’s too busy to muck around with toys and games and pranks, and the house is almost peaceful.  

Aldin tells him stories over their short rests, of his own past, of myths and legends and scraps of history. He tells Kíli about parts of the world he’s never seen, about Elves and Orcs and Men, sketching rough maps in the dirt. There’s not a lot of Middle-Earth that is still new to him. In return, Kíli talks about his family, his brother, his childhood and his hopes and dreams and fears. He admits that he’s always been useless before now, no good for anything. He whispers that he doesn’t feel like much of a prince.  

“How is he going?” Thorin visits Aldin in his little house a month after his arrival. “Hope he’s not too much trouble. You’re wearing him out.”

“Thorin.” The man chews on his pipe, eyes heavy. “That little boy is _wonderful_.” Thorin draws back. “He has incredible potential and he’s trying _extremely_ hard.”

And he left it at that.  

-

Fíli immediately hates his cousin Thorin. He lays eyes on the thirty-two year old at his welcoming feast, sitting at Dain’s right, and straight away his chest starts burning. He’s short and dumpy, with an unpleasant soft face that reminds Fíli of raw dough. His nose is a shapeless lump in his face and cold blue eyes stare out in bored disdain.  

“Is he the one Dain wants to put on the throne?” Fíli whispers to Balin that night in his room. “I could knock him out with one hand tied behind my back.” Balin only smiles, and thinks it best not to respond.  

-

“You will take your lessons with Thorin.” Dain walks with his hand at Fíli’s back. “He’s a little younger but I’m sure with your... well, you should be about the same.” Fíli give his cousin an uneasy sidelong glance, but says nothing more.  

Thorin’s schoolroom is spacious and airy. Fíli looks at the stacks of paper, the inks of different colours, the shelves groaning with books. There’s a table set up for him already, and Fíli takes a seat, feeling as though he’s a child again, in the dim little study with Balin droning on and on about dates and battles and names that he wrote down while his head swam.  

“Fíli.” The old dwarf holds his hand out in greeting. “I’m Master Alfarr. I’ll be taking you for this morning, and then Master Skjálf will have you sparring this afternoon.”  

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mastar Alfarr.” At Fíli’s side, he hears a snort of displeasure. Thorin buries the sound in a cough, eyes on his half-filled page.

The dark-haired prince doesn’t like him. It’s not exactly hatred. Fíli knows what that looks like and he can’t see it in those cold blue eyes. It’s disgust. He’s looking at Fíli as though he’s muck that he got on his shoe, a spider that crawled into his clothing while he was asleep. Something unpleasant that needed to be wiped away.  

The lesson is long and boring, nothing Fíli doesn’t already know. Alfarr asks who was King during the loss of Khazad-dûm and while Thorin stammers, Fíli is able to say quite confidently that it was Nain I after the death of Durin VI. He gets a nasty glare for that, one returned in equal measure.  

Fíli finds out that beneath all those layers of velvet and gold, Thorin is soft and pale and doughy all over. There’s something unpleasant about it, and Fíli’s stomach turns as he watches his cousin strip down for sparring practice. Skjálf is a burly dwarf, not quite as tall as Dwalin but definitely just as broad. He’s gentle with Thorin, going through basic motions and Fíli watches, bored.

Then, it’s his turn. “Come, your Highness.” Panting, covered in sweat, Thorin watches with a snarl. “Now, we’ll start simple.” The dwarf stands with feet shoulder-width apart, arms and neck loose. It’s an easy stance, a test. “Just try and see if you can- _oof_!”Fíli sees the weakness in his stance and hooks his leg around Skjálf’s ankle, as Dwalin taught him, pinning his sword arm at his back and knocking the dwarf to the ground.  

“Your left ankle was turned in.” Fíli holds out his hand to Skjálf, helping him up. Thorin is staring with very wide eyes, mouth open. “Don’t go easy on me, Master Skjálf. Nobody else does.”

-

Kíli’s getting better with each passing day. Aldin crosses his arms and watches him line up his shot, draw his bowstring and fire in a single, fluid motion. It’s as effortless as breathing to him. He’s told to practice and practice until the arrowheads blunt and the sinews crack. A red line wears into his cheek and his arm hurts but Kíli keeps it up with a grim determination. He won’t fail in this.  

“How are you feeling, my son?” Kíli looks up from his morning porridge with a little grin. There’s already something different about him, something Dís can’t put her finger on. But it’s beautiful.

“Fantastic, _Amad_.” The smile widens. “I feel... Like there was this, this weight inside of me, like a heavy stone, and it was pulling me down.” He rests a hand on his chest. “But now – I feel like it’s just gone, and... I’m lighter.” He stumbles over his words, trying to explain that soft warmth in his chest. “I feel lighter.”

Dís simply smiles. “Just don’t float away.”

-

“He’s good, your Fíli.” Balin keeps smile hidden, eyes trained on his food. “Quick mind and sturdy body. You have done well in raising him, Balin.”

“Thank you, Dain.” There are no titles, for they are cousins too, a branch further apart on that family tree. “Fíli has worked very hard to be who he is today. He has one ambition only, and that is to be a worthy King, when the time comes.”

“Indeed.” Dain pushes back his empty plate, watching Balin carefully. “He’s rough around the edges but no doubt we’ll smooth that all out, in time.” His lip twitches. “He’s not what I expected, I must say Balin. Not at all.” Balin recognises the unspoken jibe in Dain’s voice. He clearly expected an Ironfist.

-

Several months pass, slow and tedious. Fíli is bored. It becomes obvious in a matter of days that he’s leagues ahead of Thorin in almost every way. He’s stronger, smarter, faster. And beyond all of that, he is determined, in a way that his cousin could never be. _Scrappy_ is what Skjálf offhandedly calls it, taking Fíli through drills one morning. It’s obvious that he’s had to fight for what he’s got.

There are some mistakes. He doesn’t know how to recite the right prayers on feast-days and his manners are untempered. There’s a visiting ambassador from the East and Fíli is inadvertently rude and insults him, earning sharp reproval from Dain. In his room that night, Fíli burns with self-loathing and it takes a long time for Balin to calm him down and explain that little incidents like that are exactly why they are here. He’s a sharp, well-forged sword, but with a clumsy hilt.

That night, he has a nightmare about his father for the first time in years. He jerks awake and on instinct reaches out for Kíli, to hold him close and lull himself back to to sleep with that slow, gentle breathing. But he’s alone in this bed, with the silk canopy and the carved bedstead. Fíli twists his fingers in the sheets and stares up at the ceiling. He feels as though his heart has been ripped out.

-

In the early weeks of spring, Aldin floats the idea of a trip to Thorin. “His brother got to go away. Kíli feels abandoned, being trapped here.” Thorin is silent and thoughtful. “We’ll head North until late summer. I’ll teach him how to light fires with two sticks and weave tents from leaves and find his way with the stars. He’ll learn to survive in the wild. It’s an invaluable skill, Thorin.”

“And you promise to keep him safe?” The man has never heard Thorin speak with such low seriousness. He nods silently.

“I will guard the boy with my life.” Aldin promises. “He’ll return without a scratch on him.”

-

There is a feast for Mahal as the last of the snow melts away. Fíli drinks more than he should, but he can’t help himself. He finds himself sitting next to Thorin, and while Dain is occupied with his wife, his younger cousin whispers nasty asides and insults under his breath, knowing no one can hear them. Things like _peasant_ and _monster_ and _filthy half-breed._ Fíli ignores every single one of them, muffling his sharp ears under a thick veil of ale, until his cheeks redden and eyes grow hazy. Dain finally notices and sends Fíli to bed before he makes a fool of himself. With a smirk, Thorin sweetly promised to help his dear cousin up to his room.

“Don’t _fucking_ touch me.” As soon as the two were alone in the hallway, the cheer and candlelight at their backs, Fíli wrenches his arm free. “You slimy bastard - you’ve got the whole mountain wrapped around your little finger.” He wavers on his feet, hurling insults and Thorin only stands with that smug, self-satisfied smirk playing on his doughy face. “You stupid, fat, _evil_ little worm!”

“You’re just jealous.” Cold blue eyes narrow. “Look at yourself Fíli. You’re not one of us, not really. You’re _nothing_ , can’t you see? Father doesn’t even like you. He never wanted you here, it was only to stop Thorin from nagging. Do you think he would ever let someone like _you_ in power?” That smirk turns downwards into a snarl, deepening with every word. “A disgusting monster like you? You and your Ironfist blood - do you think Father would let it stain the throne?”

“You’re lying.” Fíli whispers flatly, his heart beating faster in his chest. “Dain is proud of me - he thinks I’m miles better than _you.”_

“Oh, he’ll say anything to keep Balin sweet.” Fíli’s hands ball into fists. “You and your bastard brother, you’re an embarrassment.” With a broken cry, Fíli grabs the front of Thorin’s robes, dragging him close so their faces are inches apart.

“Don’t you speak a _word_ about Kíli.” He growls. “Don’t you _dare_.” Thorin bares his teeth, hands closing uselessly around Fíli’s wrists.

“Touched a nerve, have I?” That self-confident swagger slowly creeps back into his voice. “Don’t be so blind Fíli.” The blonde is shaking with rage. “He’s a bastard and we all know it.” Fíli’s eyes widen. “Your whore mother, couldn’t keep her legs closed, could she—”

He can’t take anymore. With a yell, Fíli smashes his fist into Thorin’s stupid, doughy face. He can’t breathe, he can’t even see, just red and black, swirling together and there’s a rushing in his ears as though he’s drowning. He’s pushing Thorin into the ground, hitting him and screaming and making the blood run. There’s a pair of hands on him, trying to pull him back and Fíli lashes out at them too, the curses piling up in his mouth and tumbling out, ragged and incoherent. His fists connect with someone else and there’s a cry of pain, not Thorin’s voice but deeper, rough with anger and someone hits Fíli over the head, very hard; with a crashing wave of pain, he sinks into blackness.

-

Balin lectures Fíli for what feels like hours, when he awakes. He paces back and forth, wringing his hands glaring, his face red and lip uncharacteristically tight.

“Dain’s furious Fíli - he’s talking about sending you home now.” Fíli leans against the pillows, feeling like a plucked flower, wilted and drying. “He thinks you can’t control yourself, that you’re wild.” Fíli presses his hands over his face and breathes in and out, slowly. Balin stops and stares at the prince in his bed. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

Fíli lifts his hands away. He can see the conversation playing out in his head. He would tell Balin and then his cousin would only shake his head with a little sigh. He would say that Thorin would be one of many to talk about him and his brother. He would tell Fíli to control himself and toughen up, to learn to take those verbal blows and keep his head held high. He would tell Fíli that there was no excuse for what he had done. And there wasn’t. Fíli looked down at his bruised and swollen knuckles. His head throbbed.

“Maybe I am wild.” A hot stinging burns the backs of his eyes, and though Fíli screws up his face and grits his teeth, he can’t will the sensation away.

-

Kíli trots ahead on his pony and Aldin calls out for him to slow. He’s grinning and laughing and he can’t stop talking. He begs to look at the map again, to be shown the long, winding route they will take through forests and mountains and across rivers. They’ve only been riding for half a day and already Aldin is exhausted.

He was afraid at first that Kíli would be sullen and see straight through Aldin’s attempt to placate him. But the dark-haired dwarrow jumped up and down with joy at the news, hugging the man and giggling like a little child. He was insufferable for a week, restless and refusing to even sleep in his excitement. Aldin thought for a moment that he was being too quick and that Kíli needed more time to get a little bigger and a little more steady, but at training, he was more focused and determined than ever. He didn’t want to mess this up.

He’ll be fine. That’s what Aldin has told Thorin and Dwalin and Dís. He knows his life isn’t worth living if their precious little Kíli is hurt. He may be old and one-eyed and missing a finger but Aldin isn’t completely enfeebled, not yet.

That night, Aldin sits with Kíli by the fire and tries to teach him about the stars. It’s his first night outside, and he can’t stop looking, eyes and mouth wide open in wonder. Aldin tries to give names to the constellation, but Kíli is too busy looking to really pay attention to his words.

Kíli falls asleep easily, and for the first time in months, he doesn't think about his brother, wrapped up alone hundreds of miles away in the Iron Hills.

-

“I am very sorry, cousin Dain.” Fíli stands alone before the King, his hands respectfully at his side, eyes lowered and face twisted into apology. At Dain’s right, Thorin sits with that infuriating smirk on his face. One eye is swollen shut, his lip is split, and half of his face is black. But he was the victor. Fíli feels hatred rush inside of him, but says nothing. He remains still. “I lost my head. It will not happen again, I promise. I will compose myself.

  
“I should hope so.” Dain’s voice is a growl. “You are a _prince_ , Fíli. Do you understand what that means?”

Fíli lifts his head and there is a smouldering fire behind those dark blue eyes. It drags a soft gasp from Dain’s lips and his brow creases. He looks hurt, offended, and indignant all at once. “I know very well that means.” His voice trembles. “It means I will be King, either tomorrow or in a hundred years.” Dain refuses to shift his eyes. “I am Thror’s great-grandson and the other half of me doesn’t matter.” Fíli pauses for air, the ridges of his nails digging into his palms. “It’s irrelevant. That tribe is no longer part of my life. It never will be.”

“And this.” Dain rests his hand on Thorin’s shoulder. “Does not happen again. You two are _cousins_. You will be Kings one day. Together.” Fíli wishes he wasn’t alone in this room. “You’ve impressed me, Fíli. Thorin has done a fine job of carving you in Durin’s image.” His nails are almost drawing blood. “Don’t let it crumble.”

“I won’t.” Fíli whispers. “I swear to you Dain, I will never raise my voice or fists towards your people again.”  

-

After a month Kíli and Aldin leave the last village behind and cross into the wild. They take turns keeping watch around a small campfire, using the quiet time to fletch arrows and carve into scraps of wood. Kíli faces away from the fire sometimes, staring out into the blackness and listening to the sounds of night. He isn’t afraid. He thinks the wild is beautiful. A wolf howls and a shiver creeps along his back at the sound.

He wishes he wasn’t so small. After a week in the wild, Kíli shoots a wolf in the dusk as a precaution. He and Aldin spend the evening skinning and cleaning the beast, and steaks roast in the embers. It’s tough and leathery with a copper-taste that makes Kíli cringe. The skin is hanging up over a frame to dry, and on his watch Kíli stands before the massive fur, looking up. It towers over him, head hanging down, snarling at Kíli. He tries to sit with his back to the fur but he can still feel those lifeless sockets on him. He throws a spare shirt over its head and only then, can he have peace.

Aldin notices the shirt but says nothing. He comments that it will make a fine rug with such thick, soft fur, and that Kíli should take it home for his mother. He nods silently, looking self-consciously down at his hands.


	7. Blood Ties

Thorin has Fíli all figured out. He’s broken Fíli once, and if he can do it again, if he can draw that anger out like pus from a boil, his cousin will be sent away with no chance of finding favour in Dain’s eyes. He was so easy to tip over, and Thorin is confident he can easily push Fíli a second time.

But Fíli is determined. Coming as close as he did to losing it all has driven him even further to prove himself. Thorin is just trying to wind him up with his cruel insults about him and his brother. They don’t mean anything. He’s not a dwarrow anymore. The bruises fade on his knuckles and Thorin’s butchered face slowly returns pales into familiar soft whiteness and Fíli keeps his fists at his side through everything.

His beard grows. Fíli lies on his back and runs his fingers through the hair, feeling it spring back against his face. It’s coarse and wiry. He wants to cut it but knows he can’t, not here. These dwarves aren’t in mourning.

-

The archer and his apprentice meet the first camp of Rangers as the spring blossoms in a last colourful burst. Aldin explains the strange people to Kíli quietly, tells him to be quiet and polite and not ask any questions and keep his hands to _himself_. Kíli bites his lip and promises to behave.

There are a handful of children, a few of them around Kíli’s size. He makes instant friends and they show him the best tree-climbing spots in the area, how to trap squirrels and play their games. He’s too old for them, even for a dwarf, but Aldin lets him run free while he sits with the Chieftain and gossips. It’s been an unusually cool spring, and wargs from the north have been spotted on the horizon. Aldin shakes off the warning, promising that the pair are sharp enough to avoid harm.

That night Kíli sleeps wrapped in the wolf-skin, cheek brushing thick fur. He wonders what Fíli is doing at this moment. He wishes he could send a raven, but there are none around, and his Khuzdul wouldn’t even be good enough to give the command. He will have to wait.

He dreams that he is creeping through the brush, on his belly, with the bow in one hand as he hunts a vast grey wolf. He reaches for an arrow but his quiver is empty. Hearing the sound, the wolf turns, eyes locked on Kíli, and she pounces with a low growl.

Kíli wakes up gasping. He scrabbles at his bed-things and pushes the fur away from him, even though it is chilly and his clothes are damp with sweat. He pulls his travelling-cloak up to his chin, biting hard on his lip in case the sound of his teeth chattering carries through the night.

-

Fíli is taken out on a patrol in the first week of summer. There are twelve dwarves in all. He marches alongside the Captain, keeping his eyes sharp and his sword drawn. It’s uneventful and at in the evenings they spar. Fíli is younger than the rest by some decades but he refuses to be knocked down. He makes his opponents _promise_ to be rough with him, make him bruise. He’s longing for a good fight.

Fíli does his best, and it isn’t until he’s put up against Hrothgár, a big burly dwarf with a waist-length beard of reddish-brown, that he’s knocked square to the dirt. Hrothgár bellows with laughter as he helps the dwarrow up, declaring that no one has managed to best him in a fight yet. There’s a little ale, and Fíli sips slowly, staring at the fire with a smile. He basks in the memories.

When they think Fíli is sleeping, the others quietly discuss the golden-haired prince.

“Bit of a temper, so I’ve heard.”

“Well you’d expect that, wouldn’t ye? Putting up with Thorin all day,”

“ _Careful,_ Hrothgár.”

“Sorry, sir.”

“Look, temper or not, he’s a damn sight better than Dain’s boy and we all know it.”

“I won't stand much longer for this rudeness.”

“He’s a good fighter, with a quick head to boot. And _determined._ Mahal, he wants that crown.”

“King of what - rock and ash? I’ve heard about Ered Luin. Nothing there. They’re all smiths and miners, just trying to get by. It’s not just having a King. You need a Hall to put them in.”

“Ugh, awful business, all of it.”

“Those folk have had the rough end, and no mistake. Maybe things will turn around in a bit.”

“Hope so, for that lad’s sake.”

Fíli covers his mouth and nose with the blanket, unsure if he should be proud or ashamed of what he has just heard.

-

It is near dusk. Kíli and Aldin are stalking a deer, their clothes and skin covered in ash, hiding carefully downwind. They creep slowly through the leaves, Kíli’s bow in hand. He crouches in waist deep bush, keeping very still. Aldin communicates with hand signals, and the gentle bob of his head. The dwarf nods in silent response.

He lines up the shot and fires. There’s a cry in the air; the hart was hit in the ribs. Kíli swears and they both watch the beast turn and stumble through the trees. Gripping his bow, Kíli ploughs across dirt and bush, keeping his eyes fixed on the point where the hart disappeared. It’s not just the lost meat - it’s far crueller to leave the poor animal to run away and bleed out, slowly and painfully. He has to find him and fast, slit the throat and ease his prey to a faster death. He curses his faltering shot and plunges through the trees. Aldin drags behind, keeping up an easy jog as the air turns to a soft purple-grey.

Kíli chases the poor hart for nearly half a mile before the beast staggers and he catches up in a wide clearing. Kíli pounces, Thorin’s knife flashing and sharp metal cuts through flesh and hide. Kíli wraps an arm around the hart’s neck to hold the artery open, as Aldin taught him. He waits for the violent struggling and writhing in his arms to fade before releasing his grip, panting for air. Leaves rustle behind him. Kíli grins and wipes the knife on his tunic as he stands up.

“Got him! Took long en...” Horror wells up in Kíli’s throat and he staggers back with a choked gasp. It wasn’t Aldin.

 _A warg_.

The beast is _huge._ There’s the first pale beginning of moonlight, filtering through the trees. Kíli can’t move, he can’t breathe. He stares at the warg across the clearing, hunched and waiting to strike. There’s fifty feet between them, a gap that could be covered in seconds.

His bow. Kíli grabs it from his back as the warg pounces, pulling an arrow from the quiver. His hands are shaking badly, he tries to nock the arrow and draw the string back, but he slips and the arrow falls from his fingers. The warg is ten feet away from him and there’s nothing else he can do. With screams of _help!_ and _Fíli!_ tearing from his lungs in pure instinct, Kíli turns to run, numb and cold at once in pure terror.

And then the warg is on him. The breath is knocked out of him as predator becomes prey. Kíli reaches out but the monster has Kíli in its mouth. He’s so _huge_ , and Kíli is so small, those jagged teeth encircle almost his entire torso. There’s tearing and pain, Kíli feels as though he’s burning. He still can’t breathe. There’s a breaking in his chest, a sharp snap and a wave of agony and Kíli claws uselessly at the dirt as blood wets his clothes.

Kíli is half-conscious when a cry cuts through the night. There’s a thick, rancid smell, as though the air itself is rotting from an open wound. The warg’s teeth are gone and instead there are thick arms around him, lifting him, holding him close. He can hear the high whimpering of a wounded animal, beaten and dying. It’s _him,_ he realises dully. Kíli tries to grasp Aldin’s shirt but his fingers won’t move.

Everything is a hazy blur for a long time. Silver moonlight and a one-eyed face and an awful broken throbbing. Kíli can’t move, his limbs are slow and sluggish and don’t respond to his pleas. He eventually sinks into the darkness, with Aldin’s ragged breathing in his ear.

-

There’s a young dam giving Fíli the eye at the feast-dinner, a celebration of Svána’s birthday. She’s shockingly pretty, with wide green eyes and glossy hair and a lovely silk dress nipped in at the waist. She looks with the side of her eye, pretending to focus on her food. A smile lingers on her full red lips and Fíli can feel his heart beating very quickly inside his chest. Even when she lowers her fleeting glance and starts to talk across the table Fíli still stares at her, at her braids and breasts and soft white skin.

That night, Fíli broaches the subject of marriage for the very first time. “It’ll be arranged, won’t it?” He sits in Balin’s room, in a soft chair braided with gold.

Getting out of his fine robes, Balin sucks in a breath. “Yes, in the end.” He admits, throwing the heavy velvet over the bed and taking the footstool. Grey creeps over his beard and hair like spreading moss over a tree and there are new lines around his mouth. “We’ll find you a good dwarrowdam, my lad.” The lines deepen as he smiles. “Thorin won’t force you to marry anyone you dislike, I promise.” Balin is edging cautiously around the subject and it makes Fíli angry. He bites hard on his lip and stares down at his knees. “Believe it or not, but Thorin is a little looser than you would expect on these matters.”

Fíli sits up in bed later, leafing idly through a book and stealing occasional glances at the empty space beside him in the bed. He’s never thought much about it before - it is something he has always been afraid of, after what he had seen. All those fists and curses and insults, flung by both parties heartlessly at one another. He swore that he would be different, that he would never treat his wife the way his father did. Another facet to scrub at.

He dreams of soft green eyes and white skin that night, and wakes up tense and confused.

-

“I’m just letting you know, I have a guest for dinner tonight.” Dís watches the furling steam of her stew, the little house filling with the smell of animal bones.

“Hm? Who is it?” Dwalin sits with his sleeves rolled up to the elbow, pipe hanging idly from his mouth. Thorin has gone away for a few weeks - business, he whispered to Dwalin, and he wanted to be alone. Dwalin came over on the first night with the things he needed most all bundled up in his pack. He lies in bed and feels Dís breathe beside him all night and into the morning. She cooks him breakfast and supper, greets him with a kiss on the cheek every evening, washes his socks and undershirts and clicks her tongue when he rests his feet on the table. She’s his wife for these three lovely weeks, and Dwalin would take this simple cottage with her over all the gold in Erebor.

“Ori.” Her lip twitches. “I’ve seen dribs and drabs of him recently, but I thought with Thorin out of the house, I could sit down with him proper.” She isn’t asking Dwalin for permission. She is merely stating a fact.

“Ori? The little bastard?” He sits up at that and sets the pipe down on the table. “Are… Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“He’s lonely, the poor dear.” Dís stirs the pot, watching the gravy-brown bubble and shiver. “Nori’s gone and Dori’s strict as anything. He wants to know stories about Glori, and Dori won’t tell them.” Dwalin is silently disapproving, and won’t dare say a word. But his downcast eyes are proof enough and Dís closes her mind to his soundless judgement.

-

The warg-bite is bad. Aldin swallows deeply and pauses for a moment as he peels Kíli’s blood-wet shirt from his skin. The dwarrow is half-awake, moaning and whimpering in pain and Aldin holds his face, trying for a brief moment to calm him down. He hears an agonised whisper of _Fíli_.

He wraps Kíli as best as he can and builds a hurried fire, filling their dented pot with fresh water. Aldin waits anxiously for it to boil, all the time running his fingers through Kíli’s hair, patting his shoulder, whispering that he would be all right. Trying to comfort him. He has little in the way of herbs; he will have to search in the night, after he’s stopped the worst of the bleeding. Aldin lifts the pot away as steam furls, stirring the bandages with a stick and wincing as he wrings them out.

Guilt rages as he wraps the dwarrow in fresh-boiled rags. Kíli moans at the touch, his sweaty head turning restlessly from side to side. Aldin runs his hands over the skin, feeling for broken bones. Two of his ribs feel cracked. Far off in the distance, he hears a warg-howl. Aldin packs everything up quickly, slings his possessions across his horse’s back and rides with Kíli in his arms, small and frail-feeling as a young child.

He rides until dawn breaks over the hills. Kíli is pale, breathing short and shallow. But he’s not dead, and Aldin knows if he can keep the infection out then Kíli _should_ live. He can hope for no more than that.

-

It’s his fault. Of course it is. Kíli sleeps fitfully, leaning into Aldin’s side with that strained, shallow breathing. His four-fingered hand is wrapped tightly around Kíli’s shoulder, the other rubbing at his own burning eye. He holds Kíli like a child - he _is_ a child, so flighty and small and innocent. Just a little child.

He fell behind. He couldn’t keep up to the sprightly young dwarf. Too old; he was too old, too broken down and lamed to keep his footing and Kíli has suffered for it. He briefly touches the empty socket, swollen with scar tissue beneath his patch. He whispers _sorry_ into the air, but Kíli is sleeping and does not hear him.

-

Fíli sees the green-eyed girl again, dressed in dark velvet with a cluster of emeralds at her throat. He and Thorin walk shoulder-to-shoulder behind Dain in a procession, going to the front gate to meet some ambassador. She smiles at him, bound up like a ham in her tight dress.

Fíli’s head jerks back in a double-take that pains his neck. He scours that part of the crowd as long as he can but she’s gone.

-

Kíli wakes around nightfall. He doesn’t remember at first - it’s dark and hazy, and it’s only the feel of wolf-fur on his face that sparks his memory. He whimpers, voice weak and brittle and Aldin kneels beside him, a hand on his forehead.

“Don’t move.” The man sounds distant and far away. “Just stay still for now. You need to regain your strength.”

Every breath is agonising. Kíli tries to keep them short, to breathe through his abdomen and keep his broken ribs from moving. Aldin carefully props him against a tree-trunk, binds him tight with furs even though it’s not cold, spoon-feeding him a thin broth and waiting for the colour to return to his cheeks.

When he’s well enough to sit up on his own, Aldin strips away the bandages and cleans the wound one last time. His mouth hardens when he looks at the bite-mark, purple and red and black, the ribs visible beneath his skin. So small. Kíli cries out in pain and tries to push the man away. He can’t bring himself to look down.

“Drink this.” A little flask is pushed into Kíli’s hand. “All of it. Quickly.” It burns. Kíli coughs and retches. Liquid fire spreads in his gut and it threatens to come up again. “Hold it down lad.” He’s sorting through his pack and lifts his head, a thin bone needle in his teeth. Kíli battles a crippling wave of nausea and holds his stomach. His head feels thick and fuzzy and his fingers slow to respond. “Just breathe, all right?”

The first stitch makes Kíli gasp. He grips Aldin’s knee and bows his head as the sinew-thread is dragged slowly through his skin. It’s a slow, careful process and Aldin keeps up a low murmur of chatter for Kíli, trying to keep him calm. Kíli’s eyes lower as the flask of alcohol takes hold, he feels as though he’s moving even though the ground is solid beneath him. The soft words melt and run like candle-wax, and he can’t make them out.

He runs his fingertips over the stitches when they’re done, feeling the weave of sinew against his smooth babies-skin. Aldin helps Kíli into his clothes, hands trembling on the fastenings and ducks his head, breathing low and heavy as though he himself is in great pain.

-

Ori is shy and quiet. He hangs up his coat and scarf and leaves his worn boots by the door, toes against the wall. It’s obviously Dwalin that makes him nervous, with his broad shoulders and imposing stare, and Dís elbows him in the side and whispers to stop glowering before the dwarrow wets himself.

Dwalin slurps his stew loudly and makes a pretence of going to get something from the other house, leaving the two alone. He’s not entirely dense after all. Dís sketches a picture for Ori of a brash, red-fisted woman with grey hairs and lined eyes, half of her teeth missing and the other half blackened and rotted. She tells him simple, homespun stories that make Ori smile wistfully. Dís feels warmer for telling them. It’s almost as though Glori is in the room with them, smiling around her big clay pipe.

“But what about you?” Dís pours him an ale when she feels she can’t think of anything more, her brain is wrung out and her memories have left her. “What do you do with yourself now?”

“I help Dori most nights.” Ori mumbles. “I’m looking ‘round but there’s not much I can do.” He puts his hands on the table, thin and knobbly and bony. “The mines won’t have me, or the forge.” His eyes lower. “I can sew a little, but not as good as a dam, so I’m no good for tailoring. I want to be a scribe, the kind in Erebor Balin talked about, with the tables and the stands and the books.” Ori sighs. “I wish I could’ve seen it.”

“It was lovely.” But Dís is wracking her brain, trying to remember. She doesn’t have a single memory of that library. She never went in of her own accord.

Dwalin eventually returns, and Ori stumbles a parting apology. He’s red-faced and looks exhausted and Dís holds him for a moment, simply enjoying the feeling of having her arms around that almost-grown body, thin like Kíli but almost a head taller. She misses her own boys terribly.

“You can call whenever you want.” Dís promises in her mournful yearning. Hang Thorin if he didn’t like it. “Day or night, anytime. I’ll be here, Ori.” It’s what Glori would have wanted, and Dís burns with guilt that she has been so absent for those last few decades. She let Thorin’s words get to her, his protestations that they couldn’t mix themselves up with people like _that._

-

Aldin helps Kíli eat three times a day, threads his arms in an out of his clothes and sleeps back-to-chest with an arm wrapped protectively around the dwarrow. Kíli doesn’t leave his sight for a moment and he’s almost afraid to sleep, listening to that weak, shallow breathing in the night, heart flooding in terror with every hitch and start.

After a week of careful riding and long rests, they return to the camp of Rangers. The men shoot Aldin dark looks and mutter that he was warned of this and all he can do is confess his guilt.

After another week, when Kíli can finally breathe without pain and the worst nightmares have faded, Aldin sits cross-legged beside him in the low tent, saying that it’s time to talk.

“Your uncle, when he finds out, will be furious.” His voice is grim. “You mean _everything_ to him Kíli. When he sees that bite he won’t ever forgive me.”

“We don’t have to tell him.” Kíli reaches out with his small hand, gripping the man’s wrist. “Do we? I mean, he doesn’t ever see me undressed, only Fíli does, and he can keep a secret.” Mahal knows Kíli’s kept enough of _his._

“But Kíli—”

“It’s not _fair_ of him to send you away.” Kíli’s thin voice rises with passion. “It was _me,_ I faltered. Not you.”

Aldin is frowning, the single eye gleaming. “You faltered?”

“I had a chance to shoot him.” Kíli rakes bony fingers through his tangled mess of hair. “But- I don’t know what happened, I just froze. I tried to draw an arrow but it slipped out and then he was on me.” He ducks his head, arms wrapped tight around his waist. “I was weak.”

“You weren’t weak.” Aldin’s voice is rough. “Kíli, _never_ think you are weak. There is no shame in having a fear of wargs at your age.” He can’t deny the terror that filled his heart when he saw that awful beast bent over Kíli’s still body, mouth dripping with blood. “The strongest heroes find themselves afraid all the time, especially when they’re alone.”

-

The green-eyed dam finally speaks to Fíli one afternoon, when he’s making his way alone to the forge to get a knife fixed. She is sitting alone on a low stone wall, reading a little red book with a basket at her side. Fíli stops and stares, finding the air lost in his lungs as he stares at the curve of her slightly-bent back, the flicker of her green eyes as she crawls across the page, the wordless moving of her lips.

He wants to say hello. He wants to simply greet her, ask after her name, her position, _anything_ he can to make sure he can find her again. Fíli opens his mouth to speak, but his voice is utterly lifeless and all he can manage is an embarrassing, strangled groan.

She looks up. Fíli can feel his cheeks reddening and he wants the stone beneath him to open up and swallow him whole. He’s like a child - worse than a child, without that stubborn impudence, and all he can do is stare.

And she smiles. It’s a wide, beautiful smile and Fíli can feel his stomach softening at the sight of it. “Fíli.” Her voice is as soft and sweet as he thought it would be and she closes the book, basket dangling from her arm as she approaches him. “Such a pleasure to see the great prince of Durin in the flesh.” _Why can’t he speak?_ Fíli swallows and curls his hands into fists, willing sounds to come out from his throat. He’s humiliated, red-faced and mute. She probably thinks him simple. The dam tilts her head to one side and her smile widens.

“Áfríðr.” She introduces herself, knowing Fíli can’t speak. He can take her hand though, and raise it to his lips. He’s shaking. Her fingers are clustered with emeralds and diamonds and sapphires and he feels them bite against his skin.

Afterwards, while he’s pounding the hammer against his blade, Fíli can still feel the tingling of her rings and hand on his lips.

-

It takes a month, but Kili can finally draw the string of his bow without flinching, despite Aldin’s best efforts to ease a slow recovery from his broken ribs and torn skin. He can’t run without doubling over and gasping in pain, and he still needs long periods of rest, but the two of them continue onwards together. They cross the wildlands, retracing their steps through scrub and rock and forest. Kíli tries to shake his fears off, like flies twitching on his skin. He wears a wide smile in his hollow face and when he realises Aldin is looking at him, lowers his hands from over his lungs.

“I should be fine by the time we return home.” He slurps his stew with his shoes and socks pulled off, curling his bare toes in the warmth of the flames. “They won’t ever know Aldin. It’ll be all right.” He flashes that smile, the one too big for his thin face that makes his eyes crinkle at the corners. So young.

Aldin just smiles in wan agreement  
  
-

When Dwain next sees Ori, it is entirely by accident. He’s walking home from the forge with a sack of coal slung over one shoulder, and it’s when he hears a gaggle of laughter and a cry of pain that he stops, peering around the corner of the street and into a tight alley.

There are three dwarrows, some years older than Ori with broad shoulders and leers cut into their ruddy faces. One has him by the arms, pinned right behind his back, another is hitting him in the stomach, and the third simply laughs, encouraging Ori’s tormentor to punch him harder, sneering that bastard whoresons like Ori deserve nothing less.

Rage boils in Dwalin’s veins. “ _OI!”_ He slings the coal to the ground and stalks towards them. His shout is like a wolf-howl, scattering sheep. They don’t dare to continue what they’re doing, not in front of Dwalin with his huge tattooed hands. “You better run y’ bastards! Don’t think I don’t know who you are and where you live!” His bellow carries through the air and with his feet at Ori’s slumped figure, he crouches down, one hand on the alley-wall. “Ori.” The dwarrow is coughing, hands clutching his stomach and head bowed. He’s crying and trying not to show it, biting his lip and screwing up his eyes.

“C’mon.” He lifts Ori easily to his feet, patting him very gently on the shoulder. “Let’s get you home now.” Ori only nods, too humiliated and in pain to speak, it seems. “Boys’ll be boys and no mistake. You got to fight back once and they won’t bother you again.” They only like hurting things smaller and weaker than them and Ori is the smallest and weakest of them all. No one will dare hurt Kíli and risk incurring the wrath of Fíli and Thorin.

“C-Can’t.” Ori finally stammers out, still holding his stomach. Dwalin eyes his hands critically, so thin and bony. The hands of a writer, not a fighter. He’s not wrong. There’s not much that Dwalin can do to help him.

“If it happens again, let me know.” Ori just looks tired. “I’ll sort ‘em out.” But he nods, his auburn hair falling over his eyes.

-

Eventually, Fíli realises that the dam is following him. Whenever he’s out, she _always_ seems to be near, with her smile and green eyes and gems dripping from her pale fingers.

Thorin catches them staring at each other one afternoon, walking beside his cousin. “Ugh.” Fíli feels his gut burn with the sound of disgust. “That Áfríðr dam, cousin? She’s so _common_ , her father’s only a diplomat. Her mother’s not even one of Durin’s Folk. She’s a Firebeard, that’s where the eyes come from.”

The hatred rises. “Why does it matter?” He feels his hands curl into fists. He could strike out so easily against Thorin, and make him howl and bleed as he has done before.

“Guess it doesn’t for half-breeds.” And Fíli feels the sting of bile in his throat as he’s physically sick with hot fury. “Probably couldn’t do better than her anyway. None of _our_ noblemen would promise their daughters to you and stain their line with bad blood.”

“Shut the fuck up.” Fíli speaks with his teeth gritted very hard and he’s staring straight at Thorin’s ugly potato-nose. “You couldn’t even get a dam into your bed, Thorin. Not without paying her.”

-

Kíli and Aldin return south. The summer wanes and haymaking begins as the pair cross through the North Downs and by the time they’re back in the familiar woods outside Ered Luin the leaves are turning red and yellow and orange on the branches.

Aldin takes the last opportunity to speak to Kíli in assured privacy. “I don’t like forcing you to keep a secret.” He studies the dwarrow’s face carefully. Kíli is still bony and pale, but Aldin isn’t sure that it’s not just a return to his previous sickliness. “You’re only getting yourself into eventual trouble.”

“Oh, I’m always in trouble.” He brushes the threat away effortlessly. “Don’t worry about me Aldin.” Kíli’s face darkens briefly. “I don’t want them to know.” There’s a little twist of his lip. “I don’t want Thorin to know I was weak.”

He’s told Kíli he’s not weak, again and again until he was blue in the face. Aldin has said it more times than he can count and yet Kíli is insistent on his own failure. But he shakes his head and says Kíli is being stupid, hoping that this time he’ll get through to the poor dwarrow.

-

“Well, look at this.”

They stand facing each other in that narrow side-street. Fíli manages to stretch his lips into a smile, although he still finds it hard to speak. Áfríðr reaches out to touch his arm for just a moment, dipping her head in an attempt to seem modest.

“I finally have you alone at last.” She continues, and her fingers are running up and down his forearm, tracing the rich cloth of his tunic. “Royal duties from dawn to dusk, it must be tedious.”

Finally, he chokes air from his lungs. “It’s not so bad.” His voice trembles slightly and he forces back the urge to wince in embarrassment. “It’s an admirable duty, even.”

“Admirable, indeed.” She starts pulling a little at his wrist. “Come with me.” Áfríðr leads him into a little nook down a back alley and for a moment Fíli is confused. They stand very close in the shadows, their noses just six inches apart, their eyes locked. Fíli isn’t tall and the dam wears slippers with two-inch heels of cork. She hovers just above him with a smile playing on her soft red lips. Fíli stands silently, his hands limp and clumsy at his sides. He doesn’t know what to do.

“Well,” She whispers, with a hint of a laugh in her voice. “Aren’t you going to kiss me?” The colour drains from Fíli’s face for a cold moment and then it comes back in a hot, red flush. He closes the gap and their lips meet. He’s too scared to touch her anywhere else and keeps his hands to himself.

This is wrong, it’s so very wrong, and Fíli is screaming at himself. He’s supposed to be a _prince_ , he’s supposed to be honourable and noble and instead he’s kissing an unmarried dam in a back alley like she’s some sort of cheap thing he’s picked up at a grimy pub. He feels sick but at the same time there’s a wonderful swelling in his chest, as though his heart is bathed in sunlight and he would give anything, _anything_ at that moment to have it last forever.

Fíli kisses her for exactly three rushed, pounding beats of his heart and then pulls away. Sweat already gathers along his hairline and there’s a trembling in the pit of his stomach. Her ringed fingers close around his wrist and pull him in.

-

His mother smells just as she always did, of wood and smoke and a musky undertone of sweat. She’s squeezing him too tightly and Kíli protests that she is choking him, but Dís doesn’t let go. She strokes his dark hair gently, pressing her lips to his temple. He feels a little taller, but just as thin and bony.

Dwalin claps Kíli on the back over his newly formed scar and ruffles his hair, insisting the dwarrow looks as hale as ever. Thorin just sighs with relief and touches their foreheads together, whispering a soft prayer of thanks underneath his breath.

They all have dinner together. Kíli gets excited and gestures with his knife, retelling the stories of the Rangers, the wolf he killed, the villages they passed through, the lands they crossed.

At night Kili sleeps on his side with one hand stretched out across the pillow, head filled with uncomfortable dreams of fur and teeth and snarling. He wakes with a start, scrabbling at the blankets of his empty bed and staring up at the bunk with wide, dark eyes.

-

Áfríðr starts to send Fíli letters, begging him to sneak away and come to see her in the night, to feign sickness of the stomach and creep out when he’s left alone. He’s reluctant at first to miss his lessons and risk getting into trouble, but the memories of her lips and hands on his face dispel his fears. He lifts a hood over his neck and wears dark, simple clothes so he won’t be caught.

He hasn’t talked to dams much, certainly not without Thorin or Balin breathing down his neck. Áfríðr is quick and clever, bursting with knowledge of trade routes and politics after sixty years of living with her diplomat father, and the two of them talk for hours about everything and nothing all at once. She doesn’t have that same restraint that Fíli has found so widespread in the Iron Hills. She talks freely and debates politics and gender roles with Fíli and teases him when she knows he’s losing. She’s older than him by some twenty years but still decades away from marriage. She reminds him a lot of his mother, so quick-witted and stubborn and unafraid to speak her mind.

Áfríðr has magic in her hands, Fíli is sure of it. He’s a stumbler, popping buttons and breaking string in his big heavy fingers. He still won’t disrobe completely, and whenever Áfríðr tries to lift her skirts, Fíli takes her hands and moves them away. He’s painfully honourable and the last thing he wants to do is sully this dam. She insists that it’s nothing new to her, he won’t take anything that isn’t already lost, but Fíli won’t be swayed. They kiss and touch, dipping their hands briefly inside their clothes for a quick fumble. Fíli is still very young, and it takes so little to push him over the edge that sometimes he gets embarrassed, turning away from her and refusing to speak with his shame spilled across his stomach.

She’s certainly pretty enough, and with her jewels and velvet dresses, Áfríðr is wealthier than Fíli, although he would never admit that to her. She braids his hair for him sometimes, after she’s run her fingers through the curls and pulled the clasps out. She’s always touching him somewhere, on the face or arm or shoulder, and her eyes rarely drift anywhere else.

“Why me?” He bursts with the question two months after they first kiss, nestled on a blanket in a little cave, pressed into each other’s side. She’s curled into him, cheek resting against the plane of his shoulder and one arm stretched across his chest. He thinks he’s crude and uncouth and not polite enough. Certainly not for anyone as clever and sharp-tongued as her. Áfríðr looks up at him and smiles.

“You’re a prince.” Áfríðr declares. “And you’re beautiful.” The dam winds a curl around her bejewelled finger. “I hear so much about you. Everyone thinks you’re wonderful Fíli. You’re so much stronger and smarter than Dain’s son. And _much_ more handsome.” Her hand flattens, fingers sliding through the open front of his tunic and her leg moves against him, long and slow. Fíli holds her close and his eyes drift shut.

 “You’re not expected to be chaste.” After their heated fumbling, when Fíli’s cleaned himself up and fixed his clothes, he lies with his head in her lap, obediently letting Áfríðr weave his hair into familiar golden braids. He listens silently. “ _Someone_ has to know what they’re doing on their wedding night. Ever notice how husbands are usually older than their wives?”

“I thought that was because dams are wicked.” His ear against her thigh, he can feel the low pulse of her heart. “If you don’t marry them off early enough, then they spoil themselves.”

Áfríðr laughs, a sweet sound that makes his stomach go soft. She can’t argue with that.

-

The last six months have steadied Kíli somewhat, and tempered his lawlessness. He’s still a bright chatterbox, still breaks things all the time and winds up with a scolding all too often, but nobody can deny that there’s something else there. Aldin has tightened the bolts.

Kíli wants to write a long letter to his brother, but the further he gets on, the more he realises that his writing is utterly atrocious. He gets excited and sloppy and it’s too hard to read. With his face flushed in humiliation, Kíli reads over his scratchy attempts and realises that he can’t do this without help.

He doesn’t want _Amad_ or Thorin or Dwalin to aid him in his letters. He doesn’t want Aldin either. Kíli wants his embarrassment to remain secret. So he decides to ask the only person he knows who doesn’t look down on him, someone who spends far too much time buried in books as it is and is always seen with a pencil and scraps of paper and vellum, sketching and writing on any available surface.

He asks Ori.

“Of course I’ll help you!” He’s beaming in his excitement to be included in something that’s not Dori’s work. He doesn’t have many friends, certainly not his own age, and as Kíli looks at his awkward limbs and his horrible bowl-cut hair and his weird nose, it’s not hard to imagine why. “You can dictate to me if you want. Or if it’s s’posed to be a secret, I can teach you how to write like a scribe.”

Kíli steals his brother’s old slate and the two of them sneak down to the edge of the lake at night. Kíli concentrates harder than ever on his letters with his tongue between his teeth and a little frown on his smooth forehead. Ori is by far the _nicest_ teacher he’s ever had. He never lifts his voice, not once, and he’s always smiling, even when Kíli makes mistakes.

Dís catches her son sneaking out and follows him, a shadow in the night. She crouches behind a large rock and watches as Kíli kneels beside Ori’s waiting figure, the younger dwarf pulling a slate out of his pack.

She smiles, spying on her son for a long time, until her legs are cold and stiff and she can’t draw a breath without her teeth chattering.

-

“I know what you’re doing.” Thorin corners his cousin one afternoon during their lessons, while Master Alfarr has disappeared to the library to find a certain book. Fíli stares down at his hands and realises that his knuckles are very white. “That half-breed dam. You’re sneaking out to see her, I’ve seen you.”

Fíli doesn’t look up. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It’s a wonder he can keep his voice calm. Thorin gives an ugly, wheezing chuckle that makes the hairs stand up on the back of Fíli’s neck.

“Everyone knows, you realise. Even Father has some idea that you’re seeing someone. Wonder what he’ll say when he finds out just who it is. Such an embarrassment Fíli. Couldn’t find a full Longbeard, could you?”

He snaps with that. Fíli lashes out and grabs Thorin by the collar, getting right in his face. “If you tell your father about Áfríðr, I swear to Mahal I will _destroy_ you. Understand me?” His hands are shaking but Thorin merely snorts at him, disbelieving and utterly unafraid.

Fíli hears Alfarr’s approaching footsteps and lets his cousin go, powerless.

-

“Oh, don’t listen to Thorin.” That night, Áfríðr tries to kiss away his fears. His beard is five inches long and she loosely braids the wiry gold hair. “He’s just jealous that no one’s interested in _him.”_ She starts to unbutton his tunic, but Fíli clasps his hands around her wrists and pushes her away.

“Not tonight.” He mutters, and there are shadows under his eyes. “Áfríðr – maybe we should stop this, before it gets out of control.” The dam draws her head back, breathing quite rapidly and sounding in pain.

“You’re going to let that little _worm_ win?” The hurt in her voice cuts right into Fíli’s bones. “Is that really more important to you? So what if Dain knows? He won’t _care_ Fíli, I’ve told you, all the young lads do this—”

“But not _me.”_ He starts to pull away from her, self-consciously smoothing back his hair. “I’m a prince – I’m supposed to be honourable.”

“You arehonourable.” Áfríðr holds the front of his clothes, trying to keep him close with a smile on her lips and a dull sadness in her eyes. “You’re the most honourable dwarf I’ve ever met Fíli.” But his hands are shaking and he won’t look at her and both of them know that it won’t be the same again, not now the secret is out.

-

He avoids her for several months, throwing himself into his lessons and training with renewed vigour. Fíli sends lame excuses as to why he can’t visit, and get stiff, polite notes in reply. Áfríðr doesn’t veil her disappointment in him and Fíli feels sick with the self-loathing and the guilt.

And then, her father is sent on a mission to the southern provinces of Men. It’s so sudden, so unexpected, and Fíli just _knows_ that someone, either Balin or cousin Thorin or Dain, is behind it. He sits on the edge of his bed with the letter in his hands, breathing very heavy with his heart beating in his ears.

They meet one last time. Áfríðr knows Fíli will probably be gone when she returns and the two kneel on their blanket, getting smelly and damp now after months in the cave, holding hands and facing each other with glimmering eyes.

When she kisses him, it’s with a heat and desperation that he’s never felt before. Her fingers are in his hair, touching his face, sliding down to the hem of his tunic and pulling it out of his trousers and over his head. And this time, he lets her. He pulls and works at the laces on the front of her lovely velvet dress, peeling the brocade away from her body and almost tearing the silk underneath.

It’s everything he ever hoped for, everything he dreamed and fantasised about in the seclusion of his room. Áfríðr has trained him with her wonderful soft hands, and he’s able to hold on long enough to feel her gasp and shudder against him. There’s a breaking in his chest as he feels himself tip over like a spilled glass of wine, a painful sting undercutting that beautiful softness and he knows this is the end.

They promise to write to each other once a week and Fíli gives her a beautiful diamond ring, but deep in their hearts the both of them know that it won’t last. The letters will fade and Áfríðr will put the ring back in her jewellery box and eventually it will be as though neither of them ever existed to each other.

-

Kíli manages to hide the scar on his back for a very long time. He bathes at the river with no one else around and changes in his room and trains with a sleeveless shirt on. Aldin stops feeling as though he’s living on borrowed time and starts to relax. He knows he should be moving on soon. It’s been nearly five years since he first laid eyes on that scrappy young dwarrow and he’s taught Kíli almost everything he needs to know.

There’s a sense of pride when he sees Kíli, that feels very much like looking on a favourite son. He’s thin but no longer bony. Muscles are inflating beneath his skin and he’s at least eight inches taller. His beard hasn’t come in yet but his jaw is starting to harden and his eyes no longer look impossibly wide in his face.

But one night, after a chilly day of practice, Kíli strips out of his wet things and stands right in front of the fire in his bed things, trying to warm himself. He stands too close; there’s a smell of burning and with a cry Dís leaps up from her chair and screams that Kíli’s shirt has caught fire.

He tears the worn shirt over his head and stamps on it in his house slippers, panting. He kneels down to pick it up and turns to his mother with a little laugh, saying only the hem was burned and it was old and too-small anyway. But Dís is staring at him in horror with her hands clapped over her mouth.

“ _What in Durin’s name happened to your back?!”_

-

They all gang up on him, Thorin, Dís and Dwalin. Kíli scrabbles at the edges, pleading that it wasn’t Aldin’s fault, that he was _fine_ and Aldin saved his life, but they pay no heed, knowing he will ignore any orders to go away.

“I _trusted_ you!” Thorin goes first, roaring in his rage with hands balled into fists. Aldin sits in his human-sized chair with his hands between splayed legs. He stares down at the floor. “I _trusted_ you with the most precious thing in the world to me and you _tore him apart_!”

“What do you think you’re playin’ at!” Dwalin bellows when Thorin’s voice breaks. “I thought you were supposed to be some sort o’ master! You swore _blue_ you would protect our Kíli and then not only do you fail but you lie to us for _four years_!” His heavy fist thuds on the table. “We _never_ should have trusted an outsider!” The young dwarf is crying beside the fire. No one listens to him.

Dís curls her lip and there’s a cold fire in her eyes, the sort of primal rage that is only brought out when her children are endangered. She doesn’t trust herself to speak at all. She spits on the ground at his feet and that is enough.

Kíli is in disgrace for his lies. Thorin won’t speak to him and Dwalin only shouts and even Dís is cold. He realises it’s guilt that is souring them all against Aldin. They seemed almost convinced that Kíli would get himself hurt and this is just an affirmation of that. They were the ones in the wrong, for not seeing this coming.

He’s allowed to see Aldin briefly before he leaves. The old archer stands in the packed-up house and hugs Kíli very tightly. He tells Kíli to remember the stars so he won’t get lost. Aldin whispers yet again that Kíli is strong, stronger than everyone else realises, for bearing this alone. He slips the name of a pub in a small village into Kíli’s hand, whispering that if he wants to keep in touch, to send his letters there.

That night Kíli sits up in bed and traces the scar on the side of his chest, staring at his knees for a very long time.

-

“We will be very sad to see you go.” Dain stands with both hands on Fíli’s shoulders. He smiles. Fíli smiles back, keeping his chin up and posture stiff and perfect. “You’ve become part of the family Fíli.” Is that a flash of regret in Dain’s eyes, at Fíli’s departure?

“Until we meet again, cousin.” But despite the smile on Thorin’s face, his eyes are cold and flat and dead. Fíli is reminded of a fish, caught and gutted and lying on ice.

“Until we meet again.” He still clasps Thorin’s elbow and feigns brotherhood. It makes him sick for his own brother, his skinny little bigmouthed Kíli. Fíli remembers the long letters they exchanged to one another, somehow stiff and polite in their bulkiness. Both had secrets they couldn’t dare to share on paper. He hopes the poor dwarrow was able to cope without him.

A week into their journey, after the guards left them and turned back to the Iron Kills, Fíli crouches beside the river with a sharp knife and a little gold mirror. He pulls the braids and golden clasps out of his beard and runs his fingers through it, looking a little wistful. It’s almost down to his sternum, gleaming in the dying sunlight. Fíli cuts it close, letting handfuls of hair fall into the river. He leaves enough to curl just over his chin, and after some thought, the hair over his lip. He’s proud of what he was able to grow at his young age, and he wants some momento of it.

Balin smiles from the campfire when he sees him. “There’s the Fíli I know.” Fíli smiles back, self-consciously touching his new, short hair. “Nice moustache.”

“I’ll grow it all back.” He promises. “When we’re in Erebor and Thorin is King Under the Mountain, I’ll grow it all the way down to my waist like you.” Balin’s smile retracts a little when he hears that, and his eyes look sad.

“Of course you will lad.” He reaches out to pat Fíli on the arm. “I don’t doubt it for a moment.”

-

Kíli is too excited to wait at Ered Luin. He begs Thorin to go as far as the White Downs to meet him, and of course Thorin can’t say no to him. They ride out in a group of six, with a raven sent along advising Balin to meet them at the Grey Filly.

For five torturous days, Kíli waits. He doesn’t venture far from the pub, playing cards with Dwalin or making new arrows or looking under rocks for crickets. It’s agonising, but finally, _finally_ after wandering the marketplace in the beginnings of a winter snow he hears a gossiping housewife remark that two dwarves just came into town with their ponies and Kíli runs back to the pub and there, hanging up his coat and shaking the snowflakes from his hair is _Fíli._

The breath is knocked from Fíli’s lungs, as what at first feels like a stranger grips him with an iron force. The dark-haired figure is taller than him by at least an inch, lean and thin but still somehow solid. He hears a familiar laughing in his ear, and with his heart constricting in his chest, Fíli puts his hands on the dwarf’s shoulders and pulls him back, gasping with disbelief.

“ _Kíli?”_

-

They talk over food and ale as night deepens. Finally, after everyone else has gone to bed the pub owner shoes them upstairs, and then they talk on Kíli’s bed, sitting cross-legged until the sun peeks through the curtains and Thorin knocks at the door.

The brothers tell each other _everything._ Kíli peels off his shirt and shows his brother the scar on his back, gabbling about everything he learned and how he’s going to be the best archer the dwarves have ever been. Fíli recalls the Iron Hills, the politics and scandal and how much he hates cousin Thorin, and then he admits that he lost his virginity to a dam twenty years his senior. Nothing is secret between them.

They’re both exhausted as they ride, exchanging little conspiratorial smiles. Thorin has a long letter from Dain detailing every noteworthy event that occurred during Fíli’s stay. He tries to be negative of course, talking Fíli down, but even he can’t deny just how perfect Fíli was. He ends with the reluctant declaration that Fíli has the makings of a magnificent King. Thorin reads sections aloud as they pass over hills and meadows and pastures, his smile brighter than the unusually cheerful winter sun. 

Fíli can’t stop staring at his brother, so tall and strong, a willow tree grown from a tiny sapling. Twice he makes Kíli stand flat on his feet, back-to-back, begging for someone to measure them. Twice Kíli is a full inch taller and he grins, jumping about and crowing that he was finally the bigger brother. When they return, Dís holds her rock close for a long time, until Fíli is redfaced and embarrassed and squirms in her strong arms. That night, they share Kíli’s lower bunk, even though the both of them are too big together to really fit. Fíli snuggles into Kíli’s back, one arm around his waist with the smell of Kíli’s hair in his nose.

“Fee?” He murmurs sleepily in the dark.

“Yeah?”

“I missed you.” Kíli mumbles, half-asleep. One hand is locked around Fíli’s wrist, holding on tight. “Don’t leave again, ‘kay?”

“I won’t.” Fíli breathes against his ear. “Not without you.”

-

“It did him good.” Fíli is with Thorin, several mornings after his return to Ered Luin. He’s hammering out a blade, eyes fixed on his word and hair tied back from his face. “The separation,  I mean.” Fíli looks up. “It’s almost like he’s a different person.”

Thorin smiles, eyes crinkling with pride. “He’s still Kíli.” He assures his nephew, pausing to rest a hand on the blonde’s shoulder. “Nothing, no age or distance or separation, will ever change the fact that he’s still Kíli.”

-

Kíli writes to Aldin at least a dozen times, long crowded letters bursting with questions. His responses at first are just as rich and full, but as time goes on and the seasons pass, the old master’s words grow thin and pale. He writes that he’s getting old, his eye is growing cloudy and he can’t hear too good anymore. His bones ache and there’s an arthritis in his hands and it’s always worse in the rain.

In his very last letter, Aldin mentions there’s a persistent cough in his lungs and he’s heavy with meaning. He tells Kíli to remain strong, that there’s a world beyond Ered Luin and his uncle and brother, and he’s never been prouder of any of his pupils.

Kíli misunderstands and writes back, asking if he could come and visit in a few years, when he turns sixty and his uncle will stop breathing down his neck. Time flows differently for Kíli, who thinks he has another two hundred years left to wander this earth, who is fifty-six but still a child.

His letter is sent back, with a note scrawled on the back that Aldin passed away in the winter cold from pneumonia and he left nothing behind. Kíli runs his words over the scrawl of ink and feels his own chest start to break. The letter is wrong.

He left _everything_ behind.

-

Thirty years pass.

Like the rolling tides, Durin’s Folk ebb and flow and shift, but never really move from that one fixed spot. Babies are born and young couples are wed and old folk die, but nothing changes. Fíli tangles himself up in dams, knowing he shouldn’t, but unable to resist the lure of skin and flesh. It’s his only vice, and he doesn’t connect with them the same way he did with Áfríðr. He won’t make that mistake again. Kíli goes his own merry way, carving out a new niche for himself now that Fíli has managed to fit perfectly inside the outline Thorin drew for him so many years before. He’s a brilliant archer, deadly in precision and faster on his feet than any other dwarf. Ori’s done his best to teach Kíli his letters, but it’s like raising the dead and he never gets beyond an awful lopsided slant. He doesn’t need to, he declares. That’s what talking ravens are for.

Everybody loves him. He’s a little darling, cheerful and indestructible, even as he grows bigger than Fíli and solidifies and gets closer and closer to coming of age, Kíli is still everybody’s baby. Fíli, on the other hand, is a real King-in-waiting. He is strong and steady and no one can best him in pen or hammer or sword.

But only Kíli sees him stripped away.

Only Kíli sees him throwing a temper tantrum over stupid, little things. Only Kíli hears him start awake at night and toss and turn for hours. Only Kíli knows just how responsible Fíli is for the mischief that goes on in their town. It’s like a wound that Kíli keeps stitching up, but it’s tearing open and bleeding, refusing to heal. He can only wind bandages close and pray for the blood to slow.

But they move into an easy partnership, one where Kíli takes the blame and Fíli the glory. Neither of them mind. It’s so _easy_ to blame someone as reckless and flighty as Kíli, so difficult to assume Fíli could be so foolish. It’s Kíli’s gift to his brother. It’s what he does for Fíli in return for decades of love and affection.

Besides, it hurt nobody. So what was the worst that could happen, right?

-

There’s hundreds of candles in the feast-hall, cleaned and polished to a new sheen. Every single dwarf in Ered Luin is in attendance, and a great many Firebeards and Broadbeams besides. It is the moment Thorin has been waiting for, ever since he first laid eyes on that curly-haired little dwarrow clinging to his mother.

Fíli’s coming of age ceremony is comparatively modest. It’s far less than he deserves, as the future King of Durin’s Folk and the heir of Erebor. There’s enough for everybody to feel stuffed and push away their plates. There’s far more than Thorin ever had on his eightieth birthday, a lonely, silent affair with only Balin and Dwalin for company. It cost Thorin every coin he’s saved for years, and a few promissory notes besides. But it’s still not what Fíli deserves, not really.

And then it’s time for speeches. Thorin drains his ale and rises to his feet, a hush falling across the Hall. He gestures for Fíli to stand beside him, and he rests a hand on that broad shoulder. He’s almost as tall as Thorin now, he has been for years and it looks like he’s stopped growing. Fíli smiles at him, with silver clasps in his hair that Thorin gave him that morning. His eyes shift for a moment, to Kíli, and Dís, and Dwalin and Balin, who has now gone completely grey. His heart is beating very fast in his chest. He hasn’t discussed this with anybody else yet.

“It is with an eye on the past that we look to the future.” Kíli sits with his elbows on the table, looking up at Fíli and Thorin and only half-listening. He’s planning his own coming-of-age feast, the one he will have in five years. He doesn’t want this solemnity. He wants dancers and music and jugglers and the fire-eaters that Aldin once talked about. “We can never forget our rightful home and what has been taken from us.”

Thorin took in a breath. “And I say, it is time we took it _back!”_ Dís drops her fork and her eyes grow wide. “Too long we have toiled beneath this stone. Too long we have reduced ourselves to poverty!” She stares, remembering to keep her mouth closed and the look of shock somewhat muted on her face. “The time is now ripe for a march upon Erebor. Rumours of Smaug’s death grows louder. Ravens have been seen heading East and making new nests on the slopes of the Lonely Mountain. And now, with my nephew and heir of age, we will retake our homeland together, as King and prince, and stand as one in the King’s Hall beneath the Arkenstone!”

The air is robbed from Fíli’s lungs. He stands with his feet rooted in the stone, in his new robes, staring out at his subjects. There’s a moment of hushed silence, as Thorin’s words are quietly digested by almost two thousand dwarves.

And then the Hall erupts in cheers and roars.

-

Dís takes Kíli home a little after midnight. Most wives and children have already left, leaving one long table of burly dwarves. Fíli shines like a gold nugget amongst a basket of coal, with his blonde hair.

“I want to _stay,”_ he’s whining and dragging on her hand. “Please _Amad_ I promise I’ll be good.”

Her lip curls at the lie. “No Kíli, it’s time for the grown-ups now. Let your brother enjoy his first night of age.” Her youngest son pouts and crosses his arms in an obvious show that he isn’t old enough for this.

Kíli lies on his side in bed, with one hand under the pillow, staring at the crack of light underneath the door. Thorin’s words keep rolling around and around in his head. Erebor. The Lonely Mountain. He beams and wriggles with excitement, cocooned in soft blankets.

-

Thorin and Fíli don’t make it home until dawn and Dís knows she won’t see either of them until at least midday. She tries to do quiet chores, like dusting and sweeping and kneading dough. Her hands are shaking and whenever she closes her eyes there’s a flash of red behind them.

Finally, Thorin emerges, tangle-haired and a little red-eyed. She gives him tea and a fresh-baked slice of bread smeared with jam and butter, circling like a bird of prey around a dying animal. When the tea is drained and Thorin is wiping the crumbs from his bottom lip, she strikes.

“What on earth were you _thinking?”_ She keeps her voice low, not wanting to rouse Fíli. “You didn’t ask – you didn’t even _tell_ me before blurting it out in front of the entire town!” He stares down at his empty plate, studying a chip in the rim.

“I didn’t tell anybody.” His hollow voice makes her relax her fists, just a little. “Not even Balin or Fíli himself.”

“Why? Because you knew they would call you a fool? Because you didn’t even _think_ it through before running off your mouth?”

“I have thought this through _very_ carefully.” The sagging pouches of his red-rimmed eyes flicker upwards. “I have thought of nothing else for months. Do not think this is a decision I have taken lightly Dís. Have you forgotten the oath that I swore? If we do not act now, then Fíli is _finished_ , don’t you understand?” His voice starts to race. “I waited – for signs, for prophecies, for portents, in vain. If it is Mahal’s will for me to take that mountain back, I’m not aware of it.” Dís swallows, her mouth dry and scraping. “But I will not sit idly by and let those _monsters_ drag Fíli away. Even if we have no sign, even if I must march upon that mountain alone, I will fight for him with my life.”

And for once her life, it is Dís who has lost the fight with Thorin.

-

It’s several weeks later, and the four of them sit down to eat together. Fíli and Thorin are quiet, shooting each other little glances, and Dís keeps her eyes trained on her food, speaking to no one. But Kíli is a bundle of energy, wriggling like an excited puppy on his stool.

“So when are we going?” Thorin’s voice sticks in his throat at the question, and he can feel himself filling up inside with an overwhelming sense of horror as he stares at his nephew’s face.

“We?” His voice sounds distant, faraway and the fork slips from his fingers. Oh, Kíli. There’s a tenseness that comes across Fíli’s own face, his lips press into a hard line and he’s gritting his teeth very tightly.

“Well – yeah! We’re all going, aren’t we? We _have_ to!” Kíli rolls a little on the seat. “We’re a family.”

“Kíli – no.” Thorin hides his hands under the table, so they can’t see how madly his hands are starting to shake. “It’s too dangerous for you – it’s hundreds of miles between here and Erebor, with uncounted peril. You will stay here with your mother, and come when we are victorious.”

“Wh-what? No – _Thorin I’m going!”_ His voice rises and Kíli stands on his feet. He’s panicking, his half-eaten dinner swirls in his gut and there’s a definite stinging in his eyes. “You can’t _do_ this!” Fíli’s voice has fallen in obvious pity. “I’m the best archer in Ered Luin – probably amongst all the dwarves and one of your strongest fighters! Who would you deem fit to go if not me?”

“I’ve made up my mind—”

“It’s not _fair!”_ Kíli kicks his stool over, and Dís jumps. “I’ve been _so_ good Thorin! I-I haven’t been in trouble for months. Why does Fíli get to do everything and not me?”

“Kíli—”

“I _hate you!”_ And then he’s gone, slamming the door behind him with a force that makes the cutlery rattle on the table. The three sit quietly, breathlessly.

-

Thorin stays behind to clean up the plates, while Dís and Fíli pull on their boots and cloaks. Dís goes door-knocking, thinking he might be consoling himself with a friend or a drink, but Fíli has a better idea of where his brother will be. He climbs up to the network of tunnels and caves over Lake Malaad and sure enough he’s there, sitting in a little ball with his head pressed into his knees.

“Don’t cry.” Fíli’s soft whisper earns a tremulous gasp from the hunched figure. Kíli shudders and then slowly lifts his head, brushing roughly at his eyes with his wrist.

“I’m not.” He mutters, fixing a smouldering gaze on his brother. “Go ‘way Fíli. I don’t want to talk to you.”

“I’m so sorry.” Fíli ploughs on, kneeling down on the rock. “But Kíli, uncle is right. It’s _so_ dangerous out there, and neither of us will live with ourselves if anything happened to you.”

“You knew.” He snarls. “You _knew_ Thorin wouldn’t let me go and you didn’t even _tell_ me!” Kíli tries to push him away. “You made me look like an _idiot_!”

“Stop.” Fíli grabs him by the wrists, begging. “You have to understand – if something happens to us, then everything will fall on you, won’t it? You have to be safe, just in case—”

“Oh, don’t feed me that!” His brown eyes flash in pain and betrayal. “You’re full of it. Thorin would rather hand the crown over to Dain than me. I know I’m just a disappointment, I know I can’t make him proud like you can but I thought if I could just _show_ him then maybe he would understand!” Kíli tries to wrench his hands free, but Fíli is the stronger and will not let go. “I’m not a dwarrow anymore. I-I’ll be of age in five years, how can I not be strong enough to go with you?”

“If you got hurt—”

“Oh I don’t _care_ if I get hurt!” Fíli withdraws, eyes widening as his brother bursts in. “I would die a thousand times fighting with you, with Thorin, trying to help our people. We’re _princes_ aren’t we? That’s what we were born to do!” He stops to draw in a ragged breath. “You swore you wouldn’t leave without me again Fee. You _promised_ me!”

He’s almost going to cry again, with his forehead all wrinkled and mouth in a wavering line. And his brown eyes are pleading with Fíli, pleading with every fibre of his skinny little body and Fíli can feel himself falling away, a little further and further with the rushing pulse in his brain. He realises that Kíli wants to fight for this, he wants it more than anything else in the world and he doesn’t even realise that death is an option. It’s a distant concept, a dream. Of course he’s not going to die in this. Of course not.

And he sighs, defeated. “I did.”

-

They walk home hand-in-hand. Both remain quiet, Kíli daring to hope and Fíli feeling sick with nerves. Already regret and fear strike inside him, ugly and disjointed, rattling his bones and howling in his ears as though he’s hit the wrong notes on his fiddle.

Kíli goes straight to bed without looking at Thorin. Fíli stands with his feet shoulder-width apart, breathing in.

“Kíli’s going.” His voice is quiet, but he knows Thorin will hear him. He and Dís sit beside each other, both looking up at their little prince. “He’s coming with us to Erebor, uncle.”

There’s a heavy, resigned sigh, the lowering of his eyelids. “Now Fíli, I don’t need to explain this to you again do I? It’s too—”

“You don’t need to tell me again.” Fíli twists his hands together. “And I could talk for hours about how much you’re hurting Kíli, and how this means everything to him. Maybe he doesn’t see the danger. Maybe he does and he realises that it’s more important to fight and die than to hide away in a cave like a rat.” His voice grates in his throat and Fíli stops for a second, swallowing heavily. “He lives off your stories, Thorin. He just wants to be a worthy prince, like you were.”

“It’s complicated, Fíli.” Thorin uses that soft voice, the one he reserves for bargaining with a child and it makes Fíli’s face flush in anger.

“Then let me make it simple.” Fíli lifts his head. “If Kíli doesn’t go, then I don’t go either. You can have both of us or none of us Thorin. I’m not leaving without him.”

-

The next morning, Thorin takes Kíli aside, walking with him down to the edge of the lake. They sit for a long time and talk. Thorin makes it absolutely clear that there’s a very high risk that one or two or all three of them will not survive to the end. Kíli whispers in return that he knows what it’s like to think he’s about to die, and he’s not afraid of it.

And there’s that flash of Frerin again in those big brown eyes. But unlike Frerin, who was shaking in his boots on the morning of the battle, pacing and looking sick and whispering prayers under his breath, Kíli is strong and confident and fearless. And even though fear is still gnawing at Thorin’s insides, he claps a hand on Kíli’s shoulder and says that he know his nephew will do the Line of Durin proud.

-

“Will you bring him back?”

“Of course.” Dís has a defeated, hollow look in her eyes. “Dís I wouldn’t ever leave him. I would die for him.” He’s trying to console her but it has the worst effect. Her face crumples and she holds her hands over her mouth and dissolves into helpless, pathetic sobs.

He holds her for a long time, wondering what it is he said that broke her heart. Finally, when the tears have dried and the jagged sobs have evened out, she lifts her head.

“That’s _exactly_ what you said about Frerin.”

-

He sends out messages to his people. It’s an open letter; any dwarf who is willing to accompany Thorin to Erebor will receive an equal share of the treasure, no matter his age, position, or bloodline. Thorin expects this will bring them out in droves – after all who wouldn’t take the chance to become so dramatically wealthy and powerful?

As it turns out, nearly everybody. Sign-ups are slow, very slow, and for two months the only definite names were Thorin, Fíli, Kíli, Balin and Dwalin. Gloin came around, and eventually his brother Oin too, after Thorin’s repeated reminders that they are descendants from the same distant King.

Kíli meets up with Ori one morning and they go out into the valley together. There’s safety in numbers, Ori assures his brother, and with Kíli’s bow he’s not afraid of any danger. Ori kneels down before sapling trees and flowers, sketching with his tongue between his teeth while Kíli practices his shooting. He doesn’t see Ori set down his sketchbook and lean on his knees with his head propped up in his hands, smiling.

When they’re returning home, Ori tentatively asks if Kíli knows anything more about this venture to Erebor. Kíli shrugs.

“Only that I’m going.” And Ori’s eyes widen beneath his ragged bangs.

The next morning, Thorin receives a letter from Ori, asking to join the quest.

The morning after, he receives another in Dori’s hand, saying Ori was under no circumstances allow to have any involvement with Erebor or Dragons or Mahal knew what else.

The morning after _that_ , he receives yet another, in that patient scribe’s hand, writing that he is certainly old enough to make his own way in the world and is far past listening to fussy older brothers who only seem to take any interest in him when there’s trouble involved.

With the three letters in his hand, Thorin makes his way down to Dori’s restaurant. It’s still closed, but he’s ushered in to the little apartment the brothers share on the upper floor. It’s bright and colourful and crammed with countless trinkets and tapestries and rugs and shelves groaning with figurines. He notes the little bedroll in the corner with a warm but plain brown coverlet, the modest row of books on a narrow shelf. Ori is bent over the table, scratching away with his quill while Dori barks at him to shift his mess and clears away the papers and empty plates, asking Thorin if he would like a spot of tea.

If there had been more, of course Thorin would have told both to stay home. Glori’s bastard sons are far, far down his wishlist of able hands to accompany him. But with only seven names pledged to approach that mountain, Thorin can’t afford to be picky. Calmly and politely, he tells Ori that he would be very welcome on his quest. He looks around that overstuffed little room the purple velvet of Dori’s clothes, and then he adds with a deliberate undertone that he will _always_ have great respect among his people for the rest of his life, for his honour and bravery. With a stormy face, Dori mutters over his half-drunk tea that the two will have to discuss it.

There’s a message before noon the next day, stating that both brothers will be proud to sign their names to Thorin’s quest. Their King is out and it is Dís who sits and reads the note, jaw tight in horror.

-

“Are you excited?” Ori’s come to visit, mumbling into his scarf and hiding his hands. Kíli is draped over Dís’ chair, with a half-full ale in his hands, smiling and laughing. He tells Ori to sits and pours him a drink from the barrel in the corner.

“Of _course_ I’m excited!” He’s bouncing across the room, the grin stretching from ear to ear. Kíli pushes the ale in Ori’s hands and their fingers touch. He doesn’t notice Ori’s face glow with colour and his grip on the drink falter for a rushing moment. “Aren’t you? Finallly getting out of here and seeing the world – all the woods and mountains and the _other people_. D’you think we’ll see elves? I’ve never seen one before and while Uncle growls and goes all dark at their names, _Amad_ says they’re so pretty and tall and light. I just want to see one, up close. Did you know their males don’t even have _any_ beards at all? They’re like children?” He brushes his own stubble self-consciously, the cheery grin flickering for a moment, a candle wavering on a breath of air.

Dís comes home with Dwalin in tow to see the both of them playing with an old game-set of Kíli’s. She invites Ori to stay for supper, sharp blue eyes missing nothing. She sees the way Ori goes all soft and quiet when Kíli grins at him, the way he fumbled and dropped the dice when her son brushed innocently against his leg. She sees the utter devotion in his eyes.

Oh, poor Ori. She wants to take the little dwarf in her arms in front of everyone. He’s so painfully obvious to anyone who knew what to look for. Anyone who has been in love, who has seen it up-close and first hand will know in a moment why Ori is so stumbling and awkward and shy.

“Why are you going Ori?” She suspects, helping him into his coat. She angles herself between Ori and the rest of the house, murmuring gently.

“B-beg pardon?” He looks up at her. “Why wouldn’t I go? Just to get out of here, the rules and chores and curfew... I’m _so_ close to being grown-up but Dori still acts as though I’m ten years old.” Ori whispers his secret. “I want to see the world, auntie Dís.” He started calling her auntie a long time ago, when she started reaching out to him and invited him over for tea and telling him long stories about his mother. He doesn’t have any other dam to call his family and Dís is nothing but honoured for the title. But under no circumstance is he _ever_ allowed to call Thorin ‘uncle’, she laughs teasingly as Ori goes red in pained horror.

-

There’s setbacks. Of course there are. A stomach-sickness rips through Ered Luin and although only a few of the very young and old die, it brings daily life shuddering to a halt. Kíli gets sick, vomiting every half-hour and struggling to keep down even a sip of water. Fíli refuses to let Thorin or even Dís help him and spends every waking moment beside his brother, cleaning him up and holding his hand and whispering that he’ll be all right.

Even when his stomach settles and Kíli can finally eat again, he’s thin and pale with dark shadows under his eyes. He forces a smile and convinces his uncle that he’s all right, and he’s so good at it. Fíli stares at his lying brother and for a moment wonders if he’s been infected, the churning in his stomach is ripping through his gut and leaving a bitter taste on his tongue.

-

Thorin finally sends off a letter to Dain, advising his cousin of his intentions. He wonders what Dain really thinks, save in the Iron Kills. Probably he hopes this quest will kill Thorin and his nephews too, and leave the crown wide open for the taking.

Of course Dain writes back, and of course he writes that the quest is Thorin’s burden to bear. He nevertheless urges Thorin to continue in his efforts and Thorin taps the letter with the red seal slowly against his thigh, chewing on his lower lip as he stares into the firelight.

_Can’t back out now._

-

In the winter of Fíli’s eighty-first year, there’s a letter from Nori, addressed directly to Thorin himself. He’s close, closer to Ered Luin than he’s been in years. He asks to join the quest for Erebor, and in return, he writes, he won’t ask for a single gold coin, not if Thorin has reservations. He just wants his name wiped clean of every crime that hangs over his head.

Thorin spreads the letter out on the table, summoning Balin, Dwalin, and on a second thought, Fíli. His advisors. They sit in a ring, thoughtful. Balin is adamant that a toadstool never changes its spots, Dwalin shrugs and says it’s not as though they turned the thief’s brothers away. After some thought, with a clear memory of a scrappy dwarrow with wild auburn hair leading him through the winter forest, Fíli says it would be the most honourable thing in the world, to give Nori the chance to clear his name.

And that for Thorin seals it.

-

All of a sudden, it’s rushing up to Dís. They plan to leave on the longest day in mid-summer, after everything has been prepared and finalised and packed. Kíli is unbearable in his excitement, Fíli has a reserved quietness to him, blue eyes gleaming in his hardened face, and Thorin is dark and stormy and doesn’t like talking to anyone.

She never even asks to go. She knows it would be futile, the moment the thought springs up in her mind. Dís tears it down and refuses to allow hope to take seed. Thorin will _never_ let her go, even though she crossed the world with her two babes, even though she’s fought bears and orcs and a dozen other horrors and emerged unscathed. She is still Dís, a princess and a jewel to be treasured and kept safe and locked away. She’s not to be brought out in the world.

But Dwalin will go, and Thorin, and her two sons, and she will be alone. She’s never hated herself for being a dam until this moment. Self-loathing tears in her chest. Even though she’s stronger than half the company, Dís is a dam and a princess and will not be risked on this venture.

-

There’s no grand parting feast. There’s no money left to even attempt one. Everyone has been bled dry for the quest, gathering supplies and buying ponies and forging new sharp blades. Even Dís was set to work scoring leather and cobbling together heavy oilskin coats for her boys. Kíli’s is short-sleeved, to keep his arms and wrist clear when he’s firing his bow. Fíli’s is lined with fur, rich and thick and heavy. It is reminiscent of Thorin’s silver-black furs and Dís runs her fingers against the leather and fur, wrapped in memories that have long since turned dark and cold and dusty.

The four of them eat together muted and quiet. Even the restless Kíli is still. The weight of what they are finally doing presses down on their house, a huge rock pinning them to the earth and they cannot move or speak.

Kíli is sent to bed first, told to get his rest for tomorrow and Dís keeps Thorin and Fíli behind for a moment. It’s so obvious, even to the naive Kíli, and he listens in the shadows of his room with his ear pressed to the wall.

“Protect him.” There’s an anger in her voice, an edge of steel. She never wanted this, any of this. She doesn’t want Erebor, or the gold, or her long-lost room stuffed with treasures and love-tokens. She doesn’t want the Arkenstone or the throne of Durin. She just wants her boys. “The both of you, _swear to me_ that you will protect Kíli.”

“Of course we will.” Fíli frowns, not understanding. “ _Amad_ he’s my brother I’ll protect him with my life.” He grips her wrist and fixes her eyes on her. And she believes it. She sees the fierce love in his eyes and knows that he will. Fíli and Kíli aren’t like Thorin and Frerin. There’s no resentment, no bitter anger between them. Only love. She hugs him close and whispers in his ear that she knows it, and sends him off to bed.

Then it is her and Thorin, facing each other on their feet before the fire. Dís snarls. “I mean it Thorin.” Her brother draws back at her ragged growl. “Come back with my sons, or don’t come back at all.”

-

“Sleep on my bed.” Kíli pats the mattress beside him, swinging his legs over the edge. “C’mon, it’s our last night.”

“You’re too big now.” Fíli warns. “If you kick in your sleep, I’m ditching you.” But he indulges Kíli and dresses for bed and wriggles in beside his brother, the both of them staring up at Fíli’s bunk.

“We’re not coming back here, are we?” Kíli means that they won’t be back in Ered Luin, there’s no need for them to be after they’ve retaken Erebor. They’ll send messages for their people to come home and Dís will lead them. She is a well-worn traveller. Fíli knows that’s what he really means but the soft murmur rips into his chest and tears his heart out. It’s like a panic attack, he can’t breathe and he feels as though he’s going to be sick in his chest. He wraps his arms tight around Kíli, his stupid, skinny Kíli and tries to fight the tears back.

“We’re coming back.” He whispered. “All right? We’re coming back, I promise.”

-

Once everyone else is in bed, Dís meets Dwalin by the lake for what will be the last time. He brings a bottle of rich wine and two glasses and it’s almost comical, the way he holds it out to her and smiles with his eyes shining at her. He looks like a lovesick little dwarrow, so stupid and foolhardy and young.

She loses herself in him, again and again and again. She runs her hands over the map of scars and tattoos across Dwalin’s skin, committing every detail to memory.

“I’ll find it, y’know.” His breath trembles in her ear. “The old brooch I made for you, with the moon and stars. I’ll find it in Erebor and when you come to greet us, after we’ve retaken the Lonely Mountain, I’ll stand there with it in my hands and wait for you Dís. Until the sky falls down and the mountains crumble to dust, I’ll wait for you.”

He’s given her everything, everything he’s ever had to give. His heart, his soul, his life, her name is stamped all over it. Dís, Dís, Dís, he whispers it with every beat in his chest. She holds his face in his hands, staring at the lines around his eyes, the chunk of flesh missing from his ear, the very beginnings of grey in his face.

“I’ll marry you.” Their eyes are locked together. “Dwalin I’ll marry you beneath the feet of Durin’s statue. I’ll give you children. I’ll die in your arms. I’ll give you everything you ever wanted. Just a little late.”

He can’t speak. He can’t protest that Thorin wouldn’t allow it, even if he was King of Erebor and had all the power in the world. He can’t argue that she’s not as young as she was, that children would wear her body out. He can’t even breathe. He just grips her tight, the air choking gasps in his quivering lungs as brings his dreams like a cooling coal out of the fading embers, feeds it with tinder and breathes life to it.

They hold each other until the early hours of morning, with Dís pressed against his chest. She doesn’t want to marry him, she hasn’t for years, and yet her whispered promise fills her with light. Dwalin is utterly devoted to her, to her children, even after all these years. She is so indebted to him, and her body and blood isn’t enough. She owes him her soul and her life, the way he gave her his. She owes him a promise.

When they part, it’s not with sadness. It’s with a thrum of hope in the air. Dwalin hopes, that ember is red-hot and Dís knows it will keep him alive and spur him on more than any memory of gold or stone.

-

Her sons are dressed and shouldering their packs. Fíli is bristling with knives, thrust in his gloves, his coat, his waist, his boots. He lifts his head and looks at her, proud and confident. A prince. Kíli has his bow and blade slung across his back and Thorin’s knife in his belt. He’s not weighed down with tempered metal like his brother. He is light and free.

Dís hugs them both in turn. Durin’s sons. Ironfist sons. Fatherless sons. Her sons. She remembers kneeling in the dirt seventy-eight years ago and clawing at her stomach, boiling with hatred and rage and pain. She is filled with shame at the memory and presses her lips to Kíli’s forehead, hoping she has paid enough for her vicious and hateful heart. Dís is terrified of being punished.

“Come back.” She whispers, one hand on each shoulder. They link arms, all together, forming a little triangle with their heads bent close. “Come back to me, you hear?”

“Of course we’ll come back.” Fíli whispers the promise for both of them. “We love you _Amad_ , more than anything.”

From the edge of the cave, she watches them go. Thorin has already left, muttering he has business to take care of first in the White Downs. Most of the others are still in bed and only Fíli and Kíli are eager enough to leave in the pale dawn light.

Eager, young. She clasps her hands with eyes trained on their retreating figures. Fixed and free, sun and moon, stone and glass. Her lion-cub and her changeling. But Fíli isn’t a cub, not anymore. He is fully-grown, strong and proud and powerful. And Kíli is no changeling. He is dark and lean and quick. If Fíli is a lion then Kíli is a wolf. She can’t think of any other comparisons to draw.

The sun rises over the valley and shines in Fíli’s hair, a waterfall of gold gleaming in her eyes long after his figure has faded from view.


End file.
